Mass Effect Infiltrator: The Ghosts of New Ericson Colony
by Steve Phillips
Summary: (Story in progress) Three members of Randall Ezno's team defect from Cerberus on the same day that Randall does. Two of them, Sergeant Jordan Jensen and rookie Matt Gerrard, hide out on New Ericson colony and get more than they bargained for. You won't find Jordan or Matt in the Mass Effect wiki, I made these two people up.
1. While the Barn Burned

_The Mass Effect spinoff game "Mass Effect: Infiltrator" follows a Cerberus infiltrator, Randall Ezno. The game opens with a mission to an ice planet. Early on, Randall says to his handler Inali Renata, "Inali, I'm pretty wide of the drop zone. Where's the rest of my team?" Randall goes rogue after Inali is arrested and tortured by Cerberus._

 _Randall's team – who were they? You don't see them in the ME:I game. Did they obey Cerberus blindly and try to kill Randall, or did they have doubts and were they loyal to their friends? In my headcanon, Randall Ezno wasn't the only Cerberus infiltrator who went rogue that day. These stories follow two members of Randall's team, Sergeant Jordan Jensen and rookie Matt Gerrard, during and after the events of the ME:I game. You won't find them on the Mass Effect wiki. I made these two people up._

 _(By the way, for my take on what happened to Randall and Inali at the end of the ME:I game and beyond, see my story "Mass Effect Infiltrator: No Step Backward." The team's stories will eventually intersect.)_

…

 **While the Barn Burned**

 _Jordan Jensen_

Cerberus' _Ares_ station was in chaos.

Inside an empty barracks, two soldiers hid. They heard a rumble from a distant explosion, followed by another. They no longer noticed the intermittent cracks of gunfire, which had been a constant for the last couple of hours. Cerberus infiltrator Sergeant Jordan Jensen removed her helmet and tied her blond hair as she crouched alongside one of her team's rookies, Matt "Bowler" Gerrard. Drops of Bowler's blood stained the floor alongside him.

"Keep an eye on that door, Bowler. If anybody comes in, kill them. I don't care if you use your biotics or your sidearm. Just kill them. Try not to move your other arm while I get the medigel."

Bowler removed his helmet with his good hand, and used it to wipe sweat from his head and dark brown hair. He dropped his helmet on the floor while his left arm hung with dead weight. "I can't feel it, Sarge. It's numb. I hope the medigel works."

 _Ares_ station was one of Cerberus' most productive research facilities. Everyone informally called it the "Barn." Its bland, functionally metallic setting had endeared it to no one, except maybe The Illusive Man and the station's Director. It was quiet inside the barracks while Jordan and Bowler hid. At least they didn't hear screams from the dying. Not right now.

Jordan rubbed medigel into gunshot wounds on Bowler's arm and shoulder. Bowler uttered a deep groan, but she paid no attention. She needed to wipe away his blood and work the gel into his wound. Experience had trained her to handle combat, and her face showed none of the worry that she felt inside.

 _Ares_ had turned into a madhouse over the last few hours. Escaped krogan and asari prisoners prowled its corridors, armed with assault rifles that they'd taken from their dead captors. Signs of the prisoners' vengeance filled each room. Cerberus scientists who had tortured and murdered prisoners now littered the station like garbage. Blood and torn flesh smeared floors and splattered across walls. They had seen dead soldiers whose chests and heads were beaten flat. Others had limbs torn off, and still others were mangled so badly you couldn't tell if they were human.

Jordan sized up the young soldier with concerned eyes. "How does that feel, Bowler? Can you move your arm?"

Bowler didn't say anything at first. He flexed his knuckles white as he clutched the pistol in his hand. He gritted his teeth and groaned again as he stretched his left arm until it fully extended. "Hurts like a son of a bitch, but it works. I think I can use my assault rifle again." He put his pistol away. "I'm just glad I'm still breathing. I still don't know how you got us through that firefight."

"You mean 'we' got through it. You held your own. We're still alive, and we're going to get out of here. Got it?"

"Got it." The rookie looked over his shoulder as Jordan stored the medical gear. "Do you think anybody on the team is still alive? Other than us?" Cracks of distant gunfire sounded again. The smell of smoke permeated the air from out-of-control fires all over the station.

Jordan didn't look up as she checked her weapons. "Well, I'm sure that Randall's alive. Somewhere on this station, he's blowing something up. That guy's a one-man wrecking crew. He'll fight his way off this station. Somehow, he'll find a way." Her M-96 Mattock assault rifle still had plenty of ammo. Good thing, because they sure needed it.

She didn't say how badly she wished Randall had stayed with the damn team instead of charging off by himself to the prisoner wing, demanding answers about Inali. Nobody had so much as drawn a weapon, but the noble self-sacrificing fool didn't want to put his team at risk. Randall had told them that he might personally kick the Director's ass to get Inali out, and he didn't want to get everyone court-martialed. If only the entire team had gone with him, things would have been different. Probably.

She paused before she continued. "But the rest of the team? The other rookies? I don't know. I hope that Aussie and Mudbug are okay, but we can't worry about them. We need to concentrate on us." Her shotgun and heavy beam weapon were ready too. At least their combat armor and weapons packs would let them carry their gear without getting a hernia. The floor vibrated from an explosion rumbling from a lower deck.

Bowler kept his aim on the entrance door and stared blankly ahead. "Sarge, there's something I need to tell you. Remember when we saw Randall's face on those monitors, and found out that the Director ordered everyone to kill him on sight? And when the Director ordered the rest of us to surrender, or he'd kill us too? Ever since the shooting started, I've had awful headaches. It feels like somebody's grinding a drill inside my head. Worse than that, I've got this creepy feeling I can't shake. I'm telling myself to do things over and over again, and they don't make sense. I mean, I just can't shake it."

Jordan frowned. "We all get the shakes, rook. It's normal. Don't worry about that."

Bowler looked over his shoulder and swallowed before speaking. "But it's like I'm telling myself to do crazy stuff. I've had the shakes before, and this doesn't feel like it. It doesn't make sense."

"You're telling yourself to do stuff? Like what? Whatever it is, forget about it. I'll figure a way out of here, and then you just do what I tell you. Stay with me, and we're going to make it."

Bowler's eyes were glassy and his voice shook. "Sarge…listen, I don't know how to say this. I feel like I'm trying to convince myself that maybe Randall and Inali really did betray us. But I don't believe that, I swear. It's messed up. Ever since we got a spare moment after that first firefight, I've had this crazy idea. I feel like I need to go back and find Randall. I have to. And then maybe…"

Her eyes narrowed. Did he have shell shock? "Maybe what, Bowler?"

"Maybe stop him. Stop Randall. Maybe even…I don't want to say it. But what's crazy is, I know that I don't believe they betrayed us. And I'm freaking not crazy enough to want to hunt down Randall and bring him in myself. It doesn't make sense. I don't know why I can't just focus on helping us get out of here. What the hell's happening to me?"

Jordan's face flushed. She already knew that things were bad. But if what Bowler said was true, then things were much, much worse. She turned and looked over her shoulder at him. "How long? How long have you felt like that?"

Bowler's eyes darted nervously from Jordan's face, to her weapons pack. Finally they settled on her face. "I've felt like that ever since the Director gave his order. Ever since we saw our faces on the monitors."

She felt nauseous. "All right, listen to me. I've had that feeling too, Bowler. Exactly the same."

The young soldier's eyes widened. "You? You've had it too?"

"Yeah. I don't know what's happening to us, but the Barn has gone over to the crazy train. Right now, I've got a splitting headache, and the rest is like you said. It started for me after we heard the gunfire from the prisoner wing. I thought it'd go away, but it hasn't. This doesn't feel like doubt. This feels like I've got a creepy little devil on my shoulder whispering what to do. I don't believe any of it, because I've known Randall since we were young. We joined Cerberus together, and he's no traitor. Hell, that guy's proud to be with Cerberus. Always has been. Serving humanity and all that stuff. And Inali's the only handler I've seen who'd go into the field, pick up a rifle and put her life on the line. I trust her. But now this voice in my head, and the Director, they say that Randall and Inali are traitors. Like hell."

Bowler's shoulders relaxed. "Thanks, Sarge. I thought it was just me. It's like we're hearing the same voice. I'll be all right. It must be the shakes. Even the best soldiers get them, right?" His eyes returned to the door.

Jordan let his words hang in the air for a moment. She lifted her left hand, and ran her fingertips through her hair.

 _Funny you should put it that way, Bowler. Because I don't think it's like that. It's not "like" they have the same voice. It feels like they have_ _exactly_ _the same voice, word for word._

Her biotic implants, and Bowler's, were inside their brains and central nervous systems. She settled her palm on the back of her head and closed her eyes. Her next words would be tantamount to treason, but so what. The Director already wanted them dead, so this wouldn't change a thing. "Bowler, I think Inali was arrested because she found out something about our implants. Maybe she wanted to tell us something about our implants that the Director didn't want us to know."

Bowler's gaze remained on the door for a moment. His face turned ashen as he looked back. "Sarge, what are you talking about?"

"About a month ago, we were on the training range. The Director stopped by and watched us go through our paces. He bragged about how Cerberus was building a better breed of soldier, and how Cerberus was going to engineer away problems that we wouldn't believe. Remember?"

"Yeah, I remember that. I thought he was just blowing smoke, though. He went on and on about how his guys were going to remove our fear and improve our focus. He said that his guys were going to remove all of our doubt, too. We'd be the most dedicated and loyal troops that Cerberus had ever seen."

"Right. Well I feel like 'his guys' put something in our heads that are giving us these weird thoughts. It's making us focus on killing Randall, and it's dedicated us to that mission. Both of us."

Bowler's jaw hung open. "No." He shook his head. "No, what you're saying…they couldn't. They wouldn't. No way. Nobody can even do that."

Jordan held up her hand like a stop sign. She kept her voice steady, realizing that she'd just opened Pandora's box. Fear had a way of escalating and she needed Bowler to keep it together. "Bowler, look. I don't know what the hell's happening, but I know this much. Yesterday, we were the best infiltrator team on this station. They sent us on a mission, and Inali stayed here on the station while she tracked how our new implants performed in combat. Today? The Director says Inali's a traitor, he says Randall's a traitor, he wants us dead or alive, nobody on _Ares_ seems to have a problem with that, and the two of us feel like we're drugged or possessed or something."

"What if we're wrong? Suppose the Director didn't find out they were traitors until we were on our way back from the mission?" His words sounded mechanical, and his eyes betrayed his doubt.

"Bowler, you don't believe that any more than I do. If that were true, he would've arrested Randall right there in the hangar when we got back."

"But…the Director didn't put out a kill-on-sight order for all of us, though. He's offered us a chance to surrender."

"That's only because he's already given up on Randall surrendering, and he knows we're more badass than any of the guys on his side. He's got a huge prisoner breakout already, and he knows he'll lose even people if he tries to bring us in the hard way. We can't stay around here and hope this gets sorted out. We can't try to join up with escaped prisoners that want to shoot us first and ask questions later. We need to get the hell out of here and get as far away as we can. And we are going to get out of here. That's all that matters. You with me?"

Bowler eyes seemed to clear. His bearing straightened as she spoke, and that was a good sign. "All the way, Sarge. What do we do?"

Jordan glanced around the room until her eyes settled on a computer panel. "I'll tell you what we're going to do. First, we're going to put our electronic warfare training to good use. Inali trained the hell out of us. It'd be a shame to waste it." She strode over to the panel and drove her boot straight through its processing unit, sending out sparks and billowing smoke from the wall. She pushed pieces of the computer aside and reached her gloved hands inside, pulling out black and red signal cables. "Let's hope that doesn't set off a fire alarm. Give me your electronic warfare pack and keep an eye on that door."

Bowler handed her the pack and she started to hack into the _Ares_ station computer network. Her hands moved expertly on the keys, as fluidly as if she were a concert pianist. _Too bad I never took piano lessons as a child. I might have enjoyed it. Whatever._ Within a minute, a schematic diagram of _Ares_ station appeared on the heads-up display inside her helmet. Her brow furrowed as the words INALI J. RENATA appeared on the display, then flickered and disappeared.

"Okay, Bowler. We're in business. Look at this." She activated her holo projector, and a shimmering three-dimensional image of the station appeared between them. The display illuminated some rooms in green, others flashing in red, and the rest appeared in yellow.

"Christ, Sarge. The station's a mess."

"You're not kidding." She pointed to the image. "Okay. We're here, on deck eight. The hangar's over here, on deck three. We're going to make our way to the hangar and steal a shuttle. The green rooms are controlled by Cerberus, the red ones are out of their control, and the yellow ones have status unknown."

"Can we map a way down to the hangar?"

"That's the plan." Jordan adjusted the image and pointed. "We'll use these utility tunnels. They make up the guts of the station, and they crisscross it muscle and veins. All of the maintenance guys are defending against the prisoners, so those tunnels are deserted now. They're big enough to work in, so they should be big enough for us to crawl through. We'll go as far as the tunnels take us, and then we'll use our torches to cut through decks and walls where we need to. If we go into a room with bad guys in it, we'll use our cloaks and stay out of sight. We don't fight unless we absolutely have to. Got it?

Bowler took a breath. "Got it."

"There's a maintenance tunnel a couple of rooms away. We'll cut our way in."

"I'll get my helmet."

The words INALI J. RENATA flickered onto Jordan's holo display again. This time, the words ACCESSING VIRTUAL INTELLIGENCE appeared beneath them. A small image of Inali Renata's face materialized in the display and began to speak with her voice.

"Sergeant Jensen. This virtual intelligence was created by Inali Renata for your team fifteen hours and thirty-six minutes ago. Playing message."

"Whoa – Sarge, it's a trick. Turn it off!"

"No, Bowler, wait…I don't think so. Fifteen and a half hours ago, nobody had been arrested or shot at. This message is legit."

The stoic calm image of Inali's virtual intelligence faded away to static, and was replaced by another. It was Inali's real face. She glanced over her shoulder for a moment at some unseen object. Her green eyes were drawn with worry, and her curled auburn hair hung slightly unkempt. "Okay team. This is Inali. I hope you never see this VI or play this message. I found out some bad shit about your new implants and your recent tests. Really bad. I can't say more than that, because you never know who's listening. I don't know if the powers-that-be know what the hell the Director and his scientists are trying to do to you guys, but I don't…." Inali closed her eyes and swallowed.

Jordan and Matt shared a look.

Inali took a breath as her gaze returned forward, and she was all business. "Listen, guys. I am not messing around. What they want to do scares me, and it'll scare you. It's really that bad. I want to tell you everything in person. But if you're seeing this message, then somebody got to me first and things have gone to hell. This VI will help you guys get off the station. It knows a few things and has keys to a bunch of the doors around here. I hope this message is all for nothing, and we'll be laughing about this over a few beers in no time. Until then, you guys mean the world to me. Stay strong and stay safe. Inali out." She glanced over her shoulder again, and then reached for an unseen switch. The VI image returned.

"Jesus," said Bowler.

"All right. She didn't come right out and say it, but I think she said plenty." Jordan turned off her holo projector. After pressing some buttons on her omni-tool, a small image of the Inali VI appeared in Jordan and Bowler's heads-up displays. "Let's do a test. Inali, seal the door to the troop barracks on deck eight."

After a few seconds they heard a hard clicking sound and mechanical beep from the entrance door a few feet away. The access panel on the door turned from green to red, and the VI spoke in their helmet earpieces: "Locked."

Bowler nodded toward Jordan. "Inali, unlock that same door." Seconds later, the door's access panel turned green. The VI spoke again. "Unlocked."

"So Inali gave us the keys to get out of this dungeon. All right, Bowler, engage your cloak." As she activated her own cloak, she hefted her assault rifle. "Let's move out."

…

Beads of sweat rolled off Jordan's face as she wriggled her way around the bundles of cables and pipes that ran through the utility tunnel. The tunnel was only a few feet across and its outer wall was thin like a common air vent. Still, it was strong enough to support their weight. Bowler followed her close behind. Jordan had expected the utility tunnels to be big enough to crawl through. Sometimes, though, the space tightened down so far she thought they might get stuck. How the hell did the maintenance guys work in here? If it got much tighter, they'd need to stop using the tunnel, reach for their torches and cut their way out.

"This is like spelunking in a cave," whispered Bowler. "I wonder if Gollum ever felt like this. Myyy Precious…where is my Precious…."

Jordan hissed toward him. "Bowler, shut the hell up, will you?"

The confined space of the tunnel carried signal wires and insulated pipes for _Ares_ station's water, chemical wastes, and who knew what else. The whoosing sound of flowing liquids inside the pipes helped cover the sound of their movements. After a few minutes, voices could be heard from the rooms below them.

"Aussie, what's this I'm hearing about a damn turian infiltrator on the loose?"

After a moment's pause, a familiar voice responded. "The Director ordered my team to go to an ice planet and capture a high value turian target, sir. We brought him in yesterday."

"Well, rookie, you guys were too good at your job. You should've killed him. He broke out of the prisoner wing a couple of hours after the shooting started this morning. He might even be joined up with one of those traitors."

"If I see that turian or those traitors, I'll finish that job."

Jordan and Bowler froze in place as they overheard the voice of their teammate. Aussie was not only alive, but he had joined up with the Cerberus loyalists who fought to control the station. Bowler toggled his com and spoke softly.

"Did you hear that?"

"Yes," whispered Jordan. "I heard them. Aussie's alive. I know what you're thinking, and we can't help him. He's chosen his side. Keep moving."

Bowler remained still. "Sarge, if we're right about the implants, then Aussie hasn't 'chosen' anything. He's our teammate. He might know what happened to Mudbug."

Jordan flexed her jaw. The subtle unwanted thoughts of killing their friend Randall faded to the front of her mind again, and reminded her of what they faced. "Bowler, we can't help him. He's with them now. If we try, he'll probably fight us and we might get hurt. Or captured. We need to keep moving." She looked back and saw Bowler. Stretching her leg backward, she tapped his shoulder with her boot. "That's an order, soldier. Keep moving." Bowler said nothing, reached forward and pulled himself along.

After a few minutes, all was quiet again. Jordan addressed the VI image in her helmet. "Inali, can you access the security cameras for the room below us?"

"Accessing," said the VI. Static appeared in Jordan's helmet, followed by a grainy black-and-white image of a two-story cargo bay. Groups of gas and liquid cylinders stood double-chained and bolted to storage racks. Tall stacks of crates neatly arranged by rows stood alongside debris and shattered crates whose contents lay strewn about the floor. A group of five asari and three krogan sifted through their contents. Again, Jordan and Bowler heard the voices from below. The first voice was an asari.

"Have you found any weapons? Food?"

The second voice was a krogan. "Cerberus left us a gift. We have rifles and grenades in this crate!"

Jordan toggled her com and whispered. "Keep quiet. Let's leave these guys alone."

A pair of unseen booming explosions from below shook the tunnel and the security camera image in Jordan's HUD went black. Fire alarms sounded and gunfire erupted in the cargo bay and the tunnel shook again. Jordan wrapped her arms around the cables above her to steady herself. She looked back and saw Bowler struggling to move between stretches of pipes. Dozens of stray rifle rounds zipped through the tunnel and pierced the pipes near Bowler, spraying fluids all over him. Krogan roars mixed with the sound of gunfire echoing off the walls.

Stray rounds penetrated the tunnel and hit Bowler's midsection, making his kinetic shield crackle as it stopped the bullets from killing him. High pitched ricochets and the shrieking whistle of escaping gas reached their ears as another explosion made the tunnel lurch. Jordan's eyes widened and her knuckles turned white as she held on. The whole space made a heavy groaning sound as the tunnel started to crumple at the midpoint between her and Bowler.

"Bowler, move!"

The rookie clambered through shredded cables and sprayed fluids, but the sound of ripping metal filled their ears as the tunnel tore apart. Bowler shouted as he lunged his arm forward, too late, and plunged twenty feet down to the deck. He tumbled out of the tunnel and landed in the middle of a crossfire.


	2. Nowhere to Run

_Cerberus infiltrators Matt "Bowler" Gerrard and Sergeant Jordan Jensen are on the run, being hunted by Cerberus loyalists led by the Director of Ares Station (aka, the "Barn"). They've found out that another member of their team is with the loyalists, and to make matters worse, they're suffering from mind-control effects of their biotic implants. With the help of a virtual intelligence created by the team's handler Inali Renata, they've been trying to make their escape. But Bowler just fell right into the middle of a firefight between Cerberus loyalists and escaped asari and krogan prisoners._

…

 **Nowhere to Run**

 _Matt "Bowler" Gerrard_

Falling into the cargo bay knocked the wind out of him. Bowler struck the deck, rolled and gasped as the world spun crazily. Fire sprinklers sprayed water everywhere and he saw the shocked eyes of an escaped asari prisoner holding a rifle and looking straight down at him.

"SHIT!"

Bowler scrambled to his left and reactivated his cloak as the asari fired her rifle where he lay moments before. He gasped air as he crawled on his elbows and knees, staying low as rifle rounds crisscrossed the air inches above him. From the sounds he heard, there must have been a dozen or more Cerberus soldiers and Orcus mechs trying to kill the prisoners. He glanced to his left and saw a gaping, charred smoky hole in a side wall. Two asari lay dead nearby in a pool of purple blood, their bodies shredded by fragments and bullets. He watched as stray rounds hit a crate marked with the friendly words, "DANGER – SUPERACID INSIDE – MAY CAUSE SERIOUS INJURY OR DEATH." It leaked a clear, bubbly, sour-smelling fluid that melted a small hole in the floor within seconds.

Bowler felt nauseous watching the acid eat its way through the deck. Who the hell used a "super" freaking acid? He retreated away from the crate as he heard Jordan's voice in his headset. "Bowler, are you all right? Have they seen you? I'm out of the tunnel. I'm cloaked and on the ground."

Bowler flinched as rifle rounds flew above him. "One asari saw me. I'm cloaked near the blast hole that the troops used. The asari aren't using biotics, so I guess Cerberus drugged them or something."

"Right. It looks like we're on opposite sides of the cargo bay. Just let these guys fight each other. If you see a security camera, shoot it. After the troops are done, maybe the Director will send them someplace else. Keep using your cloak and stay the hell out of sight."

He ducked as stray rifle rounds struck the crates near him. "No problem. At least we've got cover." Another gas tank blew up, sending three Orcus mechs into the air. A krogan roared, charged forward and sent more mechs flying. Biotics or not, these prisoners weren't exactly pinned down. Bowler fired his rifle at a security camera, destroying it in a shower of sparks. Then he destroyed another. The sounds of his gunfire were lost in the mayhem.

A new voice hissed from behind. "Bowler!"

Bowler whipped around and raised his pistol. In his HUD, he saw the blue outline of a cloaked soldier with his hands up. "Don't shoot! It's me! Aussie!"

Bowler's heart pounded in his chest. _Holy shit. I'm aiming my gun at my teammate's head. Please God no._ "We overheard you, Aussie. You're with them."

"Bowler, you've gotta listen to me. Something's wrong with me. I surrendered to these guys after I got separated from Mudbug. I sure as hell don't trust them, and I think I'm losing my mind."

Bowler steadied his grip on his pistol. "Why the hell should I trust you?"

"Why? Because I snuck up behind you and said 'Bowler' instead of shooting you. Dumbass."

"Okay, okay. I guess that's a good freaking point." Bowler took a relieved breath and lowered his weapon. "Let me guess - you've got headaches and a weird psycho feeling. You have creepy 'kill Randall Ezno' thoughts that keep popping in, right?"

"Holy jeez. Are you serious? It's happened to you too?"

"Me and Jordan both. Inali made a VI to help us, and…oh, hell, forget it. I'll explain later. First things first – change the identify-friend-or-foe frequency on your stealth mode. Jordan and I want to track you, but we don't want the Director's guys to track you."

As Aussie entered new commands into his omni-tool, Bowler toggled his com. "Jordan, I've got Aussie and he's on our side."

A fireball of red and orange flame from the other side of the cargo bay drowned out Jordan's answer in heavy static. Burning chunks of chemical cylinders and fragments of crates went flying through the air. A new round of gunfire erupted along with the hissing sound of biotic attacks, including the booming sound of a biotic storm bubble. Bowler and Aussie sprinted from their cover and ran, cloaked, toward the sound of the fighting.

A moment later they saw Jordan, uncloaked, with her right side burning with flickers of fire. She rolled on the ground and pounded out the remaining flames with her arms. Orcus mechs stood impassively as they were engulfed in the inferno, and the burning robot soldiers fired their weapons at Jordan and the prisoners until they collapsed. Burning Cerberus soldiers staggered away from the shooting as others tried to extinguish the flames from their armor. Some of the remaining mechs and Cerberus soldiers riddled Jordan's cover with bullets. The rest killed the remaining prisoners. A krogan charged forward, crushing two combat mechs and killing three soldiers before it fell.

For too many precious seconds, the flames on Jordan's burning combat armor compromised her tactical cloak. Inali's VI declared, "Cerberus troops now reporting to _Ares_ Station Control that Sergeant Jordan Jensen has been sighted in Cargo Bay Twelve." After a moment, the VI spoke again. " _Ares_ Station Director authorizing additional troops and mechs to Cargo Bay Twelve."

"We have to help her, come on!" Bowler and Aussie rushed forward. To their stunned enemy, their cloaked attacks seemed to come from nowhere. Aussie threw biotic missiles and a storm bubble that destroyed two mechs and killed the Centurion commanding the troops. Bowler riddled an Orcus mech and a soldier that stood on a walkway overlooking the cargo bay, then he biotically threw a heavy crate against the mechs guarding the blast hole. Jordan re-engaged her cloak and sprinted unseen toward a group of three mechs. She drove a fist through the first, shot the second one point-blank in the head, and biotically threw the last mech into the ceiling.

Just that quickly, only the sounds of the burning debris, fire alarms and sprinklers remained.

Bowler and Aussie decloaked while Jordan scanned their surroundings. "Nice job, guys. Thanks. It looks like that's all of them, but it won't be for long. We've got to get out of here. Inali, lock all access doors to Cargo Bay Twelve. Show me the security feeds for all corridors leading here, including the decks above and below us." She turned and called to the two rookies. "Bowler, Aussie, use your biotic leashes to move the heavy crates and barricade those doors. The heavier, the better."

Neither of them moved. They only stared blankly at the carnage and wrecked room around them.

Jordan stepped forward. "Bowler. Aussie. They'll be coming for us soon, and we need to slow them down while I figure a way out. Move it."

Bowler shook his head and tried to clear his mind. "Son of a bitch, she's right. We need to move. If the Director ever thought we might surrender, he doesn't believe that now. Come on." He raised a hand and biotically lifted a pair of crates weighting five hundred pounds, then piled them up against the debris at the blast hole.

Aussie gaped at the sight of the dead soldiers. "Sarge, yesterday we would've fought right alongside these guys. We would've watched each other's backs."

Jordan put her hand on Aussie's shoulder and stood inches from his face. "Aussie, you need to listen to me. They're not our friends anymore. Inali found out that Cerberus wants to use our biotic implants to control us. Like puppets. That's why they arrested her, that's why they want Randall dead, and why they want to bring us in. We have to get out of here and we don't have much time." She turned and biotically threw another crate toward an access door as Bowler did the same.

Bowler looked back toward his teammate. "Dude, she's telling the truth. And we need you."

Aussie's actions spoke next. After a moment, he biotically lifted a pair of wrecked Orcus mechs and threw them toward one of the cargo bay's access doors.

In the three soldiers' helmets, an all-too-familiar voice spoke into their earpieces. "This is the Director of _Ares_ Station, contacting Jordan Jensen and any other rogue infiltrators who are with her. Give yourselves up. You're surrounded on all sides, and it's only a matter of time before my soldiers and mechs break into Cargo Bay Twelve. If you surrender, you will be treated fairly."

Bowler's blood ran cold as he scanned the security feeds in his HUD. "Treated fairly…sure, right. Sarge, I'm looking at the security feeds now. He's sending everything at us. It's like he told every mech and soldier on this side of the station to drop what they're doing and go after us. I'm seeing dozens of bad guys."

"I know. And it's worse. I think they're also bringing a couple of big…nevermind, all of the security feeds just went dark. Shit."

Aussie biotically lifted a pair of cylinders with volatile chemicals and gently lowered them to one of the barricades. "How bad is it, Bowler?"

"How bad? It's starting to look like the last scene of 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.' That bad."

The Director's smug voice interrupted them all. "By the way, all of you. One last thing. Don't dare to test my resolve. If you don't surrender, I will gladly pull the switch that throws each of you out an airlock. You can decide who goes first. This is your last warning."

Jordan lowered one last crate and stood silently. Turning around toward Bowler and Aussie, her eyes lit up. "Now that…just might be crazy enough to work." She toggled her com. "Inali, can you access _Ares_ Station's main hangar doors, and do you have remote flight control access to the shuttle that our team used yesterday on its last mission?"

"Yes, Jordan. Accessing hangar doors. Accessing flight control of shuttle 17."

Bowler's face contorted with confusion. "Sarge, what good is that going to do us now? We're nowhere near the hangar. They probably have guys placing explosives at the walls now. They're going to blast their way in."

His sergeant raised her hand. "Inali, open the _Ares_ hangar doors, cloak that shuttle and fly it out, and have it hold station at twenty yards from the airlock for Cargo Bay Twelve. Line up the center of the shuttle's side hatch with the center of Cargo Bay Twelve's airlock, then open the shuttle's hatch."

Bowler's face flushed white as he turned and looked over his shoulder. Aussie turned too. At the back of the cargo bay, a reinforced airlock door stood. Bowler's jaw dropped as he said, "Sarge, with all due respect…are you SHITTING me?"

Jordan's face was steady and focused as she turned toward them. She finished giving her order. "Inali, at twenty seconds after the shuttle arrives, I want you to blow the airlock for Cargo Bay Twelve. Provide audio countdown."

Aussie looked around, as though he someone nearby had an answer for him. "Sarge, that's crazy. I might as well cut my way through the floor and go it alone. Bowler, you can contact that VI too, right? Tell it to cancel her order. Tell it to stop!"

Bowler stood rooted to the ground as he looked at her. Her plan was freaking insane, but his gut told him that she might be right. Insanity might be their only option left. What would Jordan do if he told the VI to stop? Would she shoot him?

Jordan looked at them both. "Guys, listen. There's no chain of command with us anymore. You don't have to listen to me, and I'm not making you come with me. If you want to go, grab your cutting torches and go. But I'm sure as hell not staying here. The Director's probably going to blast every inch of this cargo bay to kill us."

Aussie took out his cutting torch and looked at Bowler. "I'm out of here. Bowler, you with me?"

Bowler flexed his jaw and made a fist, and prayed to God that he'd make the right decision. If he made the wrong one, well, then he'd be dead soon and he'd sure as hell give God a fucking piece of his mind. He nodded toward Jordan. "I'm with the Sarge. I'm ready to take a giant leap for mankind."

"Bloody hell," mumbled Aussie as he put his torch away. He tossed his other hand into the air and shook his head. "I'm not going it alone. The last ride is the best ride, so I'm with you two."

The Director's last attack began a moment later with twin explosions on opposite sides of the cargo bay. All of the room's lights went dark as the three former Cerberus infiltrators rushed for the nearest cover. Bowler toggled his com as his HUD automatically switched to night vision. "Inali, where the hell is that shuttle?" The VI did not respond. "Inali, dammit, talk to me!" Adrenalin flooded him as he switched his rifle to full automatic and sprayed the nearest blast hole with rifle rounds.

Jordan turned to her teammates. "All right. We have to hold for a few seconds more. Just a few seconds." They engaged their cloaks and sent a flood of biotic missiles, storm bubbles, and rifle rounds at the blast holes. Flashes of gunfire and streams of blue biotic energy lit the darkness like a lightning storm at midnight.

Orcus mechs that stepped into the breaches fell under the infiltrators' withering fire. As new mechs tried to force their way through, the three infiltrators threw gas tanks that exploded and reduced them to scrap iron. New explosions widened the breaches, and heavy footfalls shook the entire deck. A pair of massive killing machines, Ogre mechs, kicked obstacles aside and crushed debris beneath their feet. The two-armed mechanical giants each started blasting away with a Gatling gun and a beam weapon that disintegrated everything in front of it. Each of the Ogre mechs scanned the room with a single artificial eye that glowed with a malevolent crimson light. Soldiers and Orcus mechs advanced into the cargo bay and used the Ogre mechs as cover.

"Oh, hell no," grunted Aussie as he ducked from rifle rounds and burning debris. "We should've saved the gas tanks." He concentrated his rifle fire on the Ogre mech to his right, blowing off its Gatling gun.

At least a dozen Orcus mechs and soldiers had joined the two Ogres. Already their combined firepower saturated the area where the infiltrators hid and crates and pieces of equipment blew apart around them. Bowler drew his sniper rifle and aimed at the left Ogre's artificial eye. His aim was true and he blew it apart.

Bowler grinned with satisfaction from ear to ear. "Lights out, Cyclops." Then his grin vanished as his target seemed to go berserk. The Ogre on the left side stormed blindly through the cargo bay and fired its weapons wildly, sweeping them everywhere as it ran. Cerberus soldiers ran for cover, and some of them redirected their fire to the berserk, blinded Ogre. The Orcus mechs stubbornly marched forward anyway. Some of the robot soldiers had their arms and legs blown off by stray rounds from the blinded Ogre as the cargo bay became a wasp nest of heavy weapons fire.

Jordan ducked and toggled her com. "Well at least some of them are shooting at each other. Inali, how much longer? Now would be a good freaking time." Ricochets struck the floor alongside and behind her.

Inali's VI finally spoke to Bowler and Jordan. "Shuttle 17 on station. Emergency airlock detonation in twenty seconds. Nineteen. Eighteen."

Rifle rounds and plasma energy splintered their cover and struck Aussie and Jordan. Their kinetic shields saved their lives, but the impacts knocked them to the ground. Aussie was hit again as Bowler pulled him to cover, then Bowler staggered as fragments and stray rounds struck him too. He toggled his com as an Ogre's beam incinerated the cover above him. "Inali, just blow the airlock or we're all gonna die!"

A red strobe flashed above the airlock and a klaxon blared as an emergency bulkhead descended from the ceiling. After a confused moment, the sight of the descending bulkhead galvanized the Cerberus Centurion leading the attackers. She waved her arms and shouted, "Fall back! Everybody fall back to me! They're blowing this place out!" Her soldiers needed no prompting and scrambled for safety behind the bulkhead as the Orcus and Ogre mechs stood their ground and laid waste to everything in sight. Bowler, Jordan and Aussie wheeled away from their enemies and charged toward the airlock as explosive bolts blew the door free.

 _It's like we're running straight down the throat of a monster._

The door's explosion stunned and knocked all three backward. Bowler's eyes widened as decompression grabbed them like an invisible rope and sent them hurtling into the void.

Nearly everything went black as they flew forward. Bowler struck a glancing blow against the ejected airlock door as Jordan tumbled into him from behind. They careened forward, crashing against a wall.

A wall? _Holy shit. It's the shuttle. We're inside the shuttle._ Jordan leaped into the cockpit as Bowler scrambled to his feet. Looking around, he scrambled to the hatch as more pieces of debris flew past him. "Jordan, wait - Aussie's not here!"

"What? Where the hell is he?"

Bowler looked outside and saw Aussie helplessly flail and stretch his arms toward the shuttle as he floated back toward the cargo bay. _Shit. He must have hit the shuttle and bounced backward or something._ More debris bounced off the shuttle as Bowler biotically seized Aussie and yanked him to the shuttle, grabbing his arm and pulling him inside.

"I've got him. Close the hatch and get us the hell out of here." A flying broken slab from a cargo crate struck his shield and knocked him off balance.

Aussie regained his bearings and then pointed behind Bowler. "Look out!"

An Orcus mech hurtled feet-first through the shuttle's hatch and crashed into Bowler and Aussie. The three lay strewn on the shuttle's deck until Bowler scrambled to his feet and held the mech down with his forearm against its neck. Sparks flew from the mech as Aussie stomped his foot through its chest and Bowler pummeled its mechanical face.

The hatch closed, and the shuttle cabin pressurized with a hissing sound. Jordan looked over her shoulder and cocked her head. "What the hell was that?"

Bowler removed his helmet and caught his breath for a few seconds as his adrenalin faded. "That was just a stowaway. An Orcus mech. You know, a little help would've been nice." On the shuttle's monitors, he saw the station passing by them in a blur. Even at that speed, areas of the station glowed orange and red from fires raging inside the station.

Jordan waved him off. "You guys didn't need help. We're hauling ass away from the Barn. It looks like our shuttle's cloak still works, because nobody's shooting at us. I'll go FTL in a minute." Within moments, _Ares_ station was behind them and the shuttle disappeared into space.

All was quiet as Aussie removed his own helmet and dropped into the nearest seat, kicking away the wrecked pieces of the mech. "I can't believe we're here. Off the station. Alive."

Bowler sat down in the co-pilot's seat as he removed his gloves and wiped his face. "You're not kidding, Aussie. Seriously…Jordan, please tell me you have some idea about where we're going next."

She nodded. "I do, guys. My older brother Jake has some friends in very low places. He's an outlaw, and he's wanted for piracy in ten systems. He's got a lot of aliases and fake identities. He likes to call himself Captain Hook, Captain Blood, Captain America, he's got a whole bunch of nicknames. He'll help us disappear, and I know where we can find him."

"Say, Sarge…Cerberus gave me the call sign 'Bowler.' I don't want to use that anymore. I think I'll just use Matt from now on."

"All right. Matt it is. And I guess you guys can call me Jordan from now on." She looked over her shoulder. "Same for you, Aussie? You going to ditch your call sign?"

"Hell yes. I'll go with Evan Craig from now on, thanks. Don't be surprised if I keep calling you Sarge, though."

Former Cerberus infiltrator Matt Gerrard noticed something familiar on the shuttle's instrument panel. His heart sank and he tapped Jordan on the arm. "Sarge, look at the display. Someone's still here with us."

Jordan looked, and her eyes saddened. A small image of Inali's VI was displayed on the panel. "Of course," she sighed. "Inali's VI flew this shuttle to the cargo bay. I guess it's still online."

Aussie stood up and stepped over to the cockpit. As he saw Inali's face, his lips formed a tight line. "Inali. None of us would be here if it wasn't for her. She saved us all. I wish we could thank her."

Inali's face was calm, almost serene, as a backdrop of static began to envelop it. Like watching a friend stepping into a fog, within seconds the VI's image faded from sight. A black background with the stark white letters SIGNAL LOST appeared in its place.

The three soldiers shared a look, and you could hear a pin drop inside the shuttle.


	3. A Place to Hide

_Matt and Jordan are on their way to a remote colony named New Ericson, where they hope to start over and leave Cerberus behind for good. The Reapers, it turns out, began their invasion in batarian space a few days ago._

 **A Place to Hide**

 _Matt Gerrard_

Matt had to admit, it felt good to wake up in the morning and not expect to be shot at.

He blinked as he woke in a cargo bay on a transport traveling at FTL on its way to New Ericson colony. Until a few years ago, New Ericson was still known as the LV1041 mining outpost and had very few frontier types who could've been known as "colonists." Even now only a few thousand people knew it existed, and about half of them lived and worked at the colony. New Ericson was about as far removed from the mass relay network as one could get. The nearest mass relay operated about four days' travel behind them, and it was a secondary relay, not a primary one. By now Matt, Jordan, and the fifty or so passengers on their transport felt a serious case of cabin fever. "Transport" wasn't actually the way to describe their accommodations. They were actually on a small freighter. The company had ordered the crew to move around some of the crates and heavy equipment to make floor space for the passengers' cots and blankets. The cots were laid out in a rectangle across the footprint of the cargo bay. The crew seemed to view the passengers with same indifference as they regarded to the rest of the cargo.

He had awoken from a deep sleep to the sound of the other strangers waking up around him. Two-thirds of them, including him and Jordan, included new miners rotated to New Ericson for a yearlong stay. He and Jordan were different of course. They had escaped Cerberus, had forged travel documents obtained from Jordan's pirate brother Jake, and had false identities. Evan didn't join them because he had asked to stay with Jake and join his crew on Jake's pirate ship, the _Flying Dragon_. Evan's clear attraction to one of the women in Jake's crew might have had something to do with it. Matt and Jordan had thought about flying to New Ericson in the infiltrator shuttle that they had stolen from Cerberus' _Ares_ Station, but decided that it'd be better to appear as ordinary as possible and travel on a freighter. Still, their shuttle had already arrived by auto pilot at New Ericson one day ago, and would remain in stealth orbit until they arrived. New Ericson was the perfect place for Matt and Jordan to disappear, but you could never be too careful. Or too paranoid. Their shuttle carried some supplies that were perfectly ordinary, and also their tactical gear and weapons packs.

The other one-third of the passengers were refugees. The Reapers had attacked the Vular system in batarian space four days ago, and had already begun wider incursions into the galaxy along the mass relay network. The Reapers had struck such fear that there had been an instant domino effect of people not only fleeing the major population areas near the primary relays, but also fleeing smaller star systems near the secondary relays. The Reaper invasion was actually part of the reason why Matt and Jordan had decided to hide out on New Ericson colony. New Ericson wasn't exactly close to any of the relays. The Milky Way was still a big galaxy, and only a few thousand people lived there. There were still many more tempting targets out there for the Reapers to prey on. It wasn't the most optimistic way to look at things, but you had to start somewhere.

Matt sat up, yawned and stretched. His blanket fell off and the cargo bay's chilly air washed over him. "Crap," said Matt, to no one in particular. "You'd think we were meat, the way they stored us in this fridge."

"Wuss. Come on Matty, this isn't so bad." Jordan hadn't yet opened her eyes, but rolled over on her cot. She pulled her blanket up over her face. Ever since their escape, Jordan had picked up a habit of sleeping late whenever she could. Back in their Cerberus days, Jordan and Randall always woke up before the squad did. Hell, the squad wondered if they slept at all. Matt still thought of Jordan as his Sergeant, although he didn't openly call her "Sarge" anymore.

The room lights brightened enough that most people began to wake up. The freighter captain spoke over a loudspeaker. "Good morning, everyone. Another lovely day here on the _Cordoba_. We're serving breakfast in the cafeteria. Get it while it's hot. We're about eighteen hours from New Ericson, and they say they're looking forward to seeing us tonight."

The refugees, Matt had noticed, were usually the first passengers to hurry for the breakfast line. He figured that they hadn't had regular meals in a while. The children rushed to the front of the line again. Heck, a lot of them would take second helpings. After a few years of serving in Cerberus, Matt sure needed time to get used to the new environment around him. The bland, spartan environment of the freighter felt familiar, although their crew carried themselves way more casually than Cerberus people did. He saw some decorations here and there on the walls. One of the freighter's crew members always wore a Philadelphia Eagles hat, something that would've been unheard of at Cerberus. And thanks to the refugees, Matt had seen children every day of their trip. He hadn't seen kids on a day-to-day basis since he left his home to join Cerberus. Now that had been one heck of a big adjustment.

He also noticed what wasn't there. No cult-of-personality pictures of the Illusive Man. No propaganda posters with the words "HUMANITY FIRST." No propaganda posters of brave soldiers armed to the teeth and ready to kill for the cause. No posters telling him to keep a watchful eye and report suspected informants. No one made any half-serious jokes about hidden cameras and listening devices. No warnings that loose security could get people killed. None of the monitors reported news footage of non-humans committing crimes against humans. No snide remarks from the captain that the Alliance didn't really care about humans.

Two of the refugee children laughed and chased each other around the cots. One of them was human and the other was asari. One laughed, and then the other laughed too. It seemed contagious. Now that was a sound he could get used to. Did that make him a wuss? He didn't think so. His brother had a little nephew that he thought was adorable. Badass soldier or not, he was allowed to think that kids were cute, dammit.

As Matt made his way down the short corridor to the cafeteria, he leaned back as a pair of crew members walked past him. One of them said something about a power loss in the ship's engines. His fellow crew member, a dark-skinned woman who appeared to be in her forties, said something about how it was nothing to worry about, and said some engineering mumbo jumbo that was way over his head. Matt sized up their size and strength; he felt sure that he could take them in a fight. He felt a need to listen in on their conversation, just to make sure that there weren't any signs of sabotage and that the ship would arrive at New Ericson on time. He shook his head. Old habits died hard. He reminded himself that he wasn't in a combat zone, he needed to relax and stop looking over his shoulder all the time. Otherwise he'd burn himself out. Even if Cerberus hunted former rookie infiltrator badass defector and traitor Matt Gerrard, even Matt had to admit they'd have to be crazy to be looking for him all the way out here. It wasn't as though he'd done something really bad like leaving a whoopee cushion on The Illusive Man's command chair or anything.

 _Whoa. Did I just make a joke? That's a good sign._

The breakfast that plopped and dropped into his tray included hot eggs, mildly warm toast, recently-thawed sausage, steaming coffee and orange juice. He bit into the sausage, which he guessed had been made back in the 20th century – one rule about food, you were better off if you didn't ask where the sausage came from - and the hot coffee's gentle burn down his throat felt just fine. He closed his eyes.

 _No gunshots. No explosions. No dead guys littering the hallways. No getting thrown out of airlocks. No crates with sour smelling super acids leaking out and melting the floor. No creepy mind control feelings telling me to hunt down my teammates. No headaches. I didn't even have any bad dreams last night. Good stuff._

As he opened his eyes, he noticed a little blonde-haired refugee boy eyeing him curiously. He must have been about three or four years old. He was thin, but ignored his food. His parents and sister ate their food ravenously, though. His mother nudged him to eat, but he kept his eyes on Matt.

Matt nodded to the kid. "How's your food, kiddo?"

The boy hesitated and then asked, "Are you as mean as you look?"

Matt guffawed and almost dropped his coffee. He smiled trying to contain his latest bite of food, slapped the table and fought to keep from spitting out his toast. "I'm meaner than that, kid," he playfully growled. "Grrr!"

The boy smiled and tugged his father's arm. "Daddy! You're right! He's mean! Meaner than he looks!"

The boy's parents were dumbstruck. His father's eyes were wide as his mother admonished, "Tommy! That's not nice!" She looked helplessly at Matt. "He didn't mean that."

His father held up his hands. "I don't think you're mean. I only said -"

Matt waved them away. "No problem. No problem. He's just being cute." Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Jordan approaching with a tray full of food.

"Do I have any room to sit here?"

"For you? No problem, here you go. This young man just told me how mean I look."

She snickered. "Don't let him fool you, kid. Matt can't even sleep without a light on."

The boy excitedly tugged his father's arm again. "He's scared of the dark!"

She nodded to Matt. "Good to see you're making friends, Matty boy." She sipped her coffee. "It tastes like somebody left a cigarette in the brewing machine."

"I thought it tasted fine."

"You would." After a few seconds of chewing some eggs and toast, she spoke without looking up. "So we're eighteen hours away from New Ericson. You ready to have solid earth under your feet again?"

"Like you wouldn't believe, Sarge."

Jordan stared sharply at Matt before her eyes returned to her food.

Matt lowered his eyes and quickly ate another forkful of eggs. "Sorry." They weren't supposed to say anything about their former lives as soldiers, and their new fake identities said nothing about either of them ever having a military background. He began again. "Like you wouldn't believe. I think I'll get used to being a miner." He stopped himself from saying that he'd wanted to have solid ground under his feet ever since he'd been thrown out of the _Ares_ station airlock.

"Well, don't get too excited. We're trading life on space ships and space stations for life in tunnels and digging through rocks and dirt. We'll be lucky if we don't die of black lung."

"Hey, at least it's 'life'. And every day we can walk out of those tunnels and breathe fresh air, see sunsets and sunrises and all that. Not that recycled canned air crap. I'm not worried about black lung."

She aimed her eyes straight at him. "You almost sound happy. We're going to spend half our time living like rabbits and groundhogs."

Matt felt unsettled for a moment. He hadn't felt this gaze from Jordan since his first week of basic soldier training at Cerberus. He remembered a moment when he accidentally left off the safety on his rifle. Jordan and Randall had made him do two hundred pushups for that. Jordan had stood in front of him with her hands on her hips and a burning withering stare that made him feel like a target on the business end of a sniper rifle.

He glanced around at a group of eight miners who sat at the next table. They included a mix of male and female humans, a salarian, a turian, and a pair of asari. Their animated conversations included a few jokes and random talk about sports. "Well, they don't seem to mind being miners. They don't look like rabbits or groundhogs to me. Besides, rabbits and groundhogs look cute and furry."

Jordan chuckled. "To a lot of animals, cute furry bunnies and groundhogs look like dinner. Don't forget that."

Matt thought, but didn't say, _Well Sarge, you could at least try to see the bright side._ He forced a grin, nodded to Jordan's comment and took another bite of his food.

The _Cordoba_ 's captain, a good-natured (alien race person), walked into the cafeteria and greeted the passengers. The conversations died down a little, but a few people of the miners kept right on talking. They'd probably heard this type of spiel before. "Hello everyone. I'm glad to see all of you here. We'll be arriving at New Ericson later tonight. When we arrive at the space port, the (colony admin – human I guess) will be there along with a few of his people. They'll get you processed in, and I think they're going to give you a brief overview of the colony, tell you where everything's at, and then direct you all to where you'll be living. As for you refugees, they'll take care of you too. The town has a small police department, and they'll escort you to your temporary shelters. You'll probably be able to work some odd jobs at the colony and that'll make your lives a little easier.

 _Blah blah blah_ , thought Matt.

The captain continued. "Because a few of you have been asking, I have an update about the Reapers."

The hair on the back of Matt's neck stood up. Almost all of the conversations faded away and several parents hushed their children. Matt glanced for a moment toward Jordan before his eyes returned to the captain.

The captain spoke in a soothing tone. "Don't worry, don't worry, I'm not here to frighten anyone. An Alliance Navy admiral announced that the Reapers have spread along the mass relay network. She also said that they're nowhere near here. Things are worst in Batarian space, but the Alliance sent ships to help out. The Alliance Navy is handling things, in some areas they're doing an organized retreat, regrouping, and handling the flow of refugees."

The last parts made Matt's coffee feel like acid in his stomach. _Attacks have spread. Organized retreat. Regrouping. No specific info. I know doubletalk when I hear it. In other words, they got caught with their pants down and had to fall back._

The captain continued. "For now, the Alliance wants all systems to stay alert and report any sign of Reaper activity. All systems located further away from the combat zones - including New Ericson - had their alert status updated to Elevated. (Colony admin) will have more details when we arrive. For now, it looks like you guys picked a good place to go. If you have any questions, please ask." He nodded toward his first officer and then the passengers. "And now, I'm ready to have some breakfast."

A few people sitting at tables thanked the captain as he walked past them. He made some conversation and Matt could hear him cheerfully asking a refugee family where they were from. Matt looked back at Jordan. "Did you hear that? The Alliance updated New Ericson's alert status to Elevated. Like, wow," he deadpanned and snarked. "I'm sure the Alliance has a great plan. Commander Shepard has this all under control. I feel safer already."

Jordan groaned. "Yeah right. The Alliance uses alert levels named Low, Guarded, Elevated, High, and Emergency. They should name them Yawn, Be Scared, Be Really Scared, Panic, and You Poor Bastard."

Or better yet, "Ignore, Run, Hide, Surrender and Collaborate. I'm getting some more food. I'll be right back."

Matt stood with his food tray three spaces in line behind the _Cordoba_ 'scaptain and his first officer as they chattered with the cook and his helpers. Matt didn't mean to eavesdrop – he really did want a second helping of food, honestly – but he did hear one exchange that chilled his blood.

One of the cook's assistants began, "Say captain, does the Alliance really think upgrading an alert's going to help? What about these refugees?"

The captain frowned. Before he could respond, his first officer spoke. "The Alliance Navy has guys who can't even put their shoes on the right feet. Especially out here. But I could see somebody like Cerberus helping the smaller colonies out."

This wasn't going to help Matt's indigestion. He imagined tossing his tray aside and smacking the _Cordoba_ 's first officer on the back of his head. Or better yet, taking a handful of the first officer's eggs and tossing them into his face. _Idiot. He has no idea what he's saying. I'll bet he has an autographed picture of the Illusive Man in his cabin._

The captain looked over his shoulder at his first officer. He smiled and spoke jovially, but Matt noticed that the captain's smile didn't extend to his eyes. "Seriously? Cerberus? Come on, don't even mention them. I'm trying to eat a good breakfast, all right? Nobody wants help from Cerberus. Especially these refugees. Don't even get me started."

Matt thought to himself sourly, _Captain you have no idea how right you are._

The cook's assistant, a young male in his twenties, offered some eggs to Matt. He angled his head toward the end of the line. "If you want coffee, make sure you get it now. That coffee pot's about empty."

"Thanks. Hell yes. I think I need it." As Matt took an extra helping of sausage he remembered shooting at Cerberus combat mechs and fellow soldiers who used to be his friends. As he reached for a biscuit and extra butter he remembered the _Ares_ station's airlock blaring its klaxon and then blowing its door off as an invisible hand grabbed his chest and threw him and his friends out of the airlock and into space. He remembered how it felt when Inali Renata's VI faded away, knowing that Inali was gone too.

He took a breath as he poured his coffee and added extra sugar. None of that mattered now. He had to move on. They had escaped _Ares_ station. Cerberus wouldn't find them. The Reapers had a million other places to attack besides New Ericson. Matt and Jordan had an infiltrator shuttle with a good stealth capability if they needed to run. Everything would be fine. Everything.

A few people began to exit the cafeteria. A refugee family made their way past Matt and a little voice brightly said "Bye!" in his direction.

Matt turned. The young boy who had spoken to him earlier smiled and waved to Matt as his family walked out. The young former infiltrator forgot about Cerberus and the Reapers for a few seconds. He waved back, adding a smile and another playful growl. The boy's smile broadened and he kept waving. _Tommy_ , Matt remembered. _That's the kid's name._


	4. Day One on New Ericson

_Jordan Jensen_

"This has got to be the smallest space port I've ever seen. The smallest one that anybody's ever seen." Jordan scowled. She wondered if the burning feeling in the pit of her stomach had come from something in the breakfast, or maybe from the moment it sank in that she'd just started her new life in a place that made an abandoned ghost town look like a bustling metropolis.

A breeze drifted around them and puffy clouds dotted the blue sky. . New Ericson colony had no orbiting space stations and the colony's modest space port stood about half a mile from town. The space port's landing pad had a footprint no bigger than a sports field with a few sensor dishes and signal antennas. How the heck did they fill up any freighters to get anything they mined off the planet? Was this landing pad really big enough to accommodate even a decent-sized freighter? Jordan didn't care. It wasn't her problem. She noticed that a single paved road ran from the space port to the colony outskirts, which looked to be no more than a couple of miles across and its buildings looked to be no more than about five stories high. A monorail train snaked its way from the colony to a mountain range that began a few kilometers beyond the colony. From what they'd been told, the mine was located about thirty kilometers further in the mountains.

Verdant forest covered the surrounding hills that rolled across the landscape, with towering trees standing above lush greenery on the forest floor, and a vigorously flowing stream flowed past the space port about a hundred yards from the landing pad. They must have landed on a part of the planet where it was springtime.

Matt whistled at the view. "This isn't so bad. It's a small place all right, but you can't beat the fresh air, though."

Jordan cast a sidelong glance at Matt. So her friend didn't seem to mind the place. Well, good for him. But Matt's optimism had begun to grate on her nerves. Her former rookie looked relaxed. Casual, even. You'd think he'd forgotten to think like a soldier, hadn't noticed how close they came to getting killed just a couple of weeks ago, what they'd lost, or what type of life they were now stuck with.

Jordan looked around as she, Matt, the other new miners and refugees exited their transport. Old habits resurfaced as she sized up her surroundings. _Nobody's armed. Building doesn't have windows for a sniper, but the landing pad's awfully exposed if somebody took aim from the woods. The workers wouldn't stand a chance if somebody drew a gun. Bunch of amateurs._

A human worker with a cheerful smile, yellow hard hat and an obnoxious bright orange jump suit started waving the passengers toward a building that stood about a hundred yards away. She had dark hair, dark eyes and olive skin. "Welcome to New Ericson, everybody. Please make your way to the main building and they'll start processing you in. Administrator Chang and deputy admin Horadus are looking forward to meeting you."

A refugee spoke up. The refugee was the father from the family with the little boy who had spoken to Matt on the day before. "What about us? We're not miners."

"All of you, just go to the space port. They'll start sorting you there." The worker in the jump suit smiled again, waved her arms and began to repeat what she'd said before.

Jordan hefted her duffel bag and spoke under her breath. "It's the only building here, lady. I think we would've found it sooner or later." Three other workers in orange jump suits – two humans and a salarian - jogged over to the transport ship as the passengers ambled past them. The workers dragged over a couple of hoses and connected them to the transport while a fourth worker, a turian, held a writing pad and inspected the outside of ship. The hoses ran from a nearby truck with sign that read SAFETY FIRST in a dozen galactic languages.

The turian spoke as he wrote on the pad. "No signs of foreign object damage, no signs of wear from the long trip. Good stuff." He noticed the passengers walking him and gave a friendly nod. "Good morning everyone. Welcome to New Ericson."

Jordan tensed. She looked past the turian inspector as she walked by him within a few yards. She noticed that Matt seemed to avert his eyes toward the horizon as he walked past the turian, too. Only weeks ago, in the days just before everything had gone to hell, Jordan and Randall Ezno had led their infiltrator team to capture a high value turian target on their last mission for Cerberus. The damn turian had turned out to be good in combat and had shot and killed one of the team's rookies before they had captured the turian alive. And then, after all hell had broken loose on _Ares_ , while she and Matt were crawling through that utility tunnel trying to escape, they had overheard a rumor that Randall had actually joined up with that same turian. You couldn't make this stuff up. The surreal feeling of knowing that she had killed other turians in battle and that turians had died at the hands of secret Cerberus scientists on _Ares_ station hung in her stomach.

Jordan's eyes narrowed as she walked through a doorway into the space port's main building. The bright light of day gave way to the bland stale artificial lighting of a small warehouse. It looked like the miners used the building as a staging area for managing cargo until the miners moved it to the colony. A flight of stairs led to a door that overlooked the warehouse, and it was labeled "Operations Center." It was probably where the space port control staff worked. Jordan guessed that they probably didn't have much to do on a day-to-day basis, unless they also managed sky car and sky cargo truck traffic. Two bare tables stood in an open space on the warehouse floor where a young male human and an asari scanned the travel documents from each passenger. Both of them wore coveralls with the words _Rokas Natural Resources Ltd._ Oh yeah, they all worked for a mining company now.

Jordan stepped toward the young human mine worker and handed him her travel documents. He looked to be in his early twenties. After a quick scan the man's indicator flashed green. "Everything looks good. Here you go. Let me get you a couple of things."

She nodded and said nothing. Jordan's pirate brother Jake had done a nice job forging their travel docs. Ever since she and Matt had boarded their transport, their travel documents hadn't been a concern. Jake must have had a lot of experience in smuggling people, or helping them disappear. She had always seen her brother as a goofball growing up, but Jake had sure found his niche as an outlaw. Who would've thought.

The young mine worker stepped away from his table, returned and handed a handbook and small satchel to Jordan. "This handbook will have your room assignment in the living quarters, and it'll tell you where everything's located at the colony. Where to eat, where the fitness center's located, a couple of stores, things like that. The satchel has a few small personal items for your first day. Toothpaste, toothbrush, soap, couple of snacks, you get the idea. You'll also have some basics waiting for you in your quarters. You new guys should assemble at the monorail tomorrow at 0800. Once you get to the mining site, they'll start training you, they'll show you all sorts of boring safety videos, but some fun stuff too. Don't worry, before you know it you'll be handling heavy duty mass effect grinders, plasma drills and high powered crushers. Maybe they'll even let you near explosives."

A grin crossed Jordan's face. Cerberus had probably taught her as many ways to blow things up as any of the explosives experts on the planet knew. Hell, she probably knew more. She feigned an impressed look. "Explosives? That sounds dangerous."

The guy from the mining company smiled broadly. "Oh, you like explosives, do you? We've got all kinds."

"They make me nervous."

"Oh, they're not so bad if you know how to handle them."

The young man's asari co-worker gave him a nudge on his shoulder. "Focus, Danny boy. I know she's cute, but focus."

Duly chastened, the young man gestured over his shoulder. "Well you're good to go. Welcome to New Ericson. Step over to those chairs behind me, and colony admin Chang and deputy admin Horadus will greet you guys before you head to the colony."

"Thanks." A couple dozen chairs arranged in a square stood behind them. Jordan noticed an Asian woman of medium height and a tall turian making small talk with a couple of new miners. She sat down toward the back of the group of chairs and looked around for her traveling companion. Matt found her a moment later and he looked slightly pale.

"What's up with you?"

"Nothing. Every time I see an asari, I remember…well, you know."

 _He still thinks about those desparate asari he saw dying in the Ares cargo bay_ , Jordan thought. "You can't help that. Forget about it," she said tersely.

"Well, there's more," he persisted. "That asari had to scan my travel docs three times before they went through. I thought for sure that it wouldn't work."

"But it turned out to be no problem. Move on already."

She said nothing to Matt's puzzled look in her direction as they settled into their chairs near the back row. Within a few minutes the last of the new miners sat down near them. The woman scanned the group, opened her arms in welcome and spoke.

"Hello everyone and welcome to New Ericson. I'm colony administrator Evonna Chang and this is deputy administrator Tasso Horadus. I have an open door policy and you're welcome to call me Eve. We're really glad to have you here for your rotation. If you could ask any of the miners who were just rotated out, I'm sure they would've told you that they did their share of hard work, but that it was an exciting and rewarding experience for all of them."

Matt browsed his handbook and paid little attention to the colony's leader. Speaking to no one in particular, he whispered, "Does this handbook have anything on hiking trails or rafting in those forests?"

Jordan browsed her own. _Hmm. This planet has eezo, iridium, palladium, platinum, and a number of the fuels used for fusion reactors…_

Evonna continued. "I've only been the admin here for six months, as Rokas Natural Resources likes to keep the leadership fresh and engaged. They change admins every five years." She gestured toward the turian alongside her. "Tasso here was the admin before me, and he did a fantastic job. I hope that I've learned well from him."

Her turian colleague added, "It's true. Someone actually trusted the welfare of a colony to someone like me. By the Spirits, the people in charge of the Rokas company must be insane. And if anyone can find that company sky car I misplaced, Evonna needs it back. Please return it so that they don't dock my paycheck."

Jordan, Matt and the rest of the miners chuckled. The jokes weren't that funny but they appreciated the effort.

"Deep space probes only discovered New Ericson a couple of decades ago, and for a few years it didn't have a name. It only had the designation LV1041. Probes surveyed the planet for a few years, and they found resources in a variety that you usually don't find on other worlds. Your handbook will mention what we mine here. But what your handbook doesn't mention is that we've found out some exciting things over the last year. Even in just the last couple of months. There's a new section of the mine with naturally carved tunnels like the Martian lava tubes, and we found some exotic things that really thrilled our chemists and rock hounds. They aren't even sure what to make of some of it, and we've contacted some outside scientists on the Citadel. We've just begun to explore it, and who knows what we might find. About ten years ago the mining complex had expanded enough that our little colony began to grow around it. There's only a couple thousand of us, but it's really an exciting time to be here on the frontier. Now I'll let Tasso here say a few words. By the way, Tasso gave New Ericson its name."

Tasso Horadus' mandibles widened in the turian equivalent of a smile. "That's true too. I have an admiration for stories about those human Viking explorers." He towered over Evonna, but his bearing was deferential as he waited for her to step aside. "Thanks, Evonna. Welcome to New Ericson, everyone. Like Evonna, I've served as one of the foremen of the mine before I took my turn as the colony admin. I know you're all ready to get to your quarters and relax after a long time spent on a freighter, so I'll be quick. You probably think you're out in the middle of nowhere, and you're right, but we've actually had some miners volunteer to extend their rotation and stay longer. The colony has grown enough that the company has started allowing miners to bring families if they have them, and unlike a lot of planets this place is still natural enough that the air and water is as clean as any place you'll find. We run this place with a diverse staff, and we find that the diversity of our workforce is one of its greatest strengths. We run a safe mine too. Every place has lost time injuries from time to time, but we're ranked third among Rokas mines for lowest workplace accident rate. We're proud of that and we intend to keep it up. When you need to blow off steam, you'll find that the colony has good rec facilities and equipment, a lot of people take part in sports leagues, and there are a couple of bars in the colony proper. Just play nice everyone. The less reports we get from police chief Zikov or the doctors at the clinic, the happier we are."

Jordan snorted and yawned. _Sounds great,_ thought Jordan. _As long as the Reapers find other places that have more people to kill than here, they'll let you guys dig in the dirt as long as you want_. So this was where her life had gone. She had pledged her loyalty to Cerberus and to defend humanity. Now after a few exciting years of doing her part, fighting for a cause and feeling like she was an important part of something bigger than herself, Cerberus had betrayed her and her team, people were dead, and she had been sentenced to spend her obscure life digging dirt, crushing rocks and probably getting black lung while having to listen to boring speeches by turians, weak ineffectual humans, and God only knew what other non-humans who ran this place. This was no life for her. She already missed being on the edge.

"Jordan," Matt whispered, looking at his handbook. "You're not going to believe this."

"What?"

The former rookie looked excited, as though he could barely contain himself. "One of the bars serves pizza. They freaking have pizza here."

Jordan closed her eyes, shook her head, and pinched the middle of her brow. _Just freaking great._

 _..._

 _Evonna Chang_

A few hours after wishing the new miners a restful night, Evonna Chang rose from her console and walked over to a break room. The whistling sound of steam escaping from a kettle promised a relaxing mug of chamomile tea. Thank God the periodic unmanned cargo shuttles brought a few luxury items. Evonna, or "Eve" as her friends called her, had a few simple pleasures that she would never give up, and tea was one of them.

She poured her tea into her favorite mug. It was a heat sensitive mug based on the _Harry Potter_ book series. Without any tea, some text on the mug read, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." As she poured her tea into the mug, the text disappeared and gave way to new text that read, "Mischief managed." Almost everyone else in the building had gone home, but she knew one person still remained.

"Working after hours again, Eve? That's a bad habit. I don't think I ever worked late when I was admin."

She turned and wearily smiled at her turian friend. "Liar. I know how hard you worked. Tasso, shouldn't you be somewhere else? Go home."

He picked up a drink of his own. "You're not just my boss, you're a good friend. I overworked during my first months as admin, and I almost went crazy. Trust me, it's overrated. You have a staff, you know. You don't need to run this colony by yourself."

She returned to her desk and settled down to look at her console. "I have just a few more messages, then I'll be done." Evonna looked at the turian sympathetic face and sighed. She rubbed her forehead and closed her eyes. "Were there any more fights last night? Any vandalism?"

"Chief Zikov tells me that someone reported finding the words 'Humanity First' spray painted in a couple of alleys. They're getting those removed. That's not too big a deal. Except for the graffiti, it looks like some of our problem children decided to get along for another week."

"Maybe they finally decided to act like grownups."

"That would be nice, but I wouldn't bet on it. Zikov doesn't think so either."

"Me neither." After a moment's pause, Eve asked, "I saw the latest news reports about the war. The latest thing I heard from the company and the Alliance gave their usual spiel. Stay alert, be prepared, follow the advice of authorities. Did you hear anything I might've missed?"

The turian's lowered voice expressed his concern. "No. Nothing that you haven't already heard. It sounds really bad. Millions already in immediate danger, especially the Batarians. Even the news reports admit that it's terrible there. Billions more under threat on Earth and Palaven. The footage from the war areas are cleared by Alliance censors, so it makes me wonder what footage they didn't want to show. I try not to pay attention to the rumors. How many more refugees arrived today?"

"Twenty-five, including more kids. That makes about two hundred refugees total. They're all sleeping on cots at the fitness center. Or sleeping on the floor. They've been through a lot but they're glad to be here now. They feel safe. We're assigning more people to help out with them, and asking for volunteers. Chief Zikov says they're a well-behaved bunch, and they haven't been a problem. No disturbances. Every time I think about how safe things are here, I feel guilty. It's like being in a house that's safe while a neighbor down the street has their house on fire. And I'm wondering when the fire's going to spread."

"I know. I feel the same way. But it's natural, Eve. Try not to be too hard on yourself." He took a drink from his own cup.

"How did you handle it while you were admin?"

"Ryncol. Lots of ryncol. And gallons of that tequila stuff that you humans like."

Evonna laughed and almost spat her tea onto a pile of papers. "You're the best."

"Thanks. Now go home already."

"Not just yet, Tass. I just heard from the clinic about that miner who acted up in the new tunnels. His name's Ricardo Fuentes."

The turian leaned forward. "I saw the first report. The miners on site said that Fuentes had 'tunnel madness.' A few of the miners say that they don't like working down there, but others don't seem to mind. What did the doctors say?"

"Well, as you know, Fuentes reported hearing and seeing things, and he seemed pretty shaken. Drs. Moto and Tannius say that his neural scan showed some unusual brain activity, but his fellow miners' scans turned up clear, and they can't isolate a cause. He hasn't reported any mental illnesses before."

"Maybe he hid his symptoms. Some of these miners would rather lose a limb than admit a health problem."

"Could be. Some of the other miners who've been in the new tunnels reported feeling unsettled while they're working, but that seems understandable. Fuentes isn't improving and they're having him stay overnight. Tannius and Moto both want us to send him off-world so that someone can take a better look at him."

The turian frowned. "This couldn't have come at a worse time, with the Reapers crawling around the mass relay network. If Fuentes had something more routine, I'd be fine with letting Veso Tannius or Yumi Moto handle it. But if something's affecting his brain, I don't think we should wait for a medical shuttle. That'd take days."

"I agree. I'll ask the captain of today's transport to hold off his departure, and I'll talk with Veso and Yumi too. We could send one of the lower-level doctors, but I'd rather that Veso and Yumi play paper-rock-scissors over which of them gets to escort Fuentes. What did the safety people say about that new part of the mine?"

"They've done another thorough check, and there's nothing in that would account for anything like this."

Eve looked at the doctor's report sadly. She longed for the days when her only responsibility was a couple dozen workers, not a couple thousand colonists and refugees. "So we have a miner, Ricardo Fuentes, who was working in the newest part of the mine. Now his brain seems to be acting funny, and nobody knows why. Some people feel uncomfortable in that part of the mine, but otherwise they're all healthy. So that doesn't count as a safety concern. And our safety people say that part of the mine is clean. Not a sign of radiation, no nasty chemicals, nothing that would explain it."

"Do you want me to have them do another check? Or prohibit access to the new tunnels?"

She sighed. "Here's what I want them to do. I want the safety guys to extend their studies from what they 'know' would happen, to what they think 'might' happen. If they brainstorm something, I don't care how crazy, I want to know what their ideas are. Have them ask other safety guys off-world, too. Continue exploring the new sections, and if anybody has odd neuro symptoms no matter how minor, we take them offline and get them looked at. And if it's more than just feeling nervous, we shut down that part of the mine until further notice."

"You've got it."

Eve rose from her desk and looked at her papers again. Tasso rose from his chair.

"Tass?"

"Yes, Eve?"

"What are we going to do if the Reapers ever come here?"

No one in the colony's admin offices had given this thought voice until now, but it needed to be said. A chill sank into her. She noticed that her turian friend looked out the window before his eyes returned and he answered her question.

"Eve, New Ericson is what you humans would call a small fish for the Reapers. If the Reapers have run out of enough prey that they finally come here, then we're all in very deep trouble."

"I guess that's true." It was little consolation, but it had to do for now. She put her papers away. "Let's call it a night." Eve couldn't shake the image of a house fire, cowering in a bedroom closet, and having nowhere to run. The Reapers were worse than that. House fires took lives and showed no mercy, but they didn't deliberately hunt living things. They didn't have galactic reach. "I told the new miners that it's an exciting time here on the frontier. Right now I wouldn't have minded boring, boring, boring."


	5. Having Pizza and Meeting Prolus

_Matt Gerrard_

Most of New Ericson was owned and run by the Rokas mining company. Almost everything had the sole purpose of keeping the colony running: an administration building, security, a small hospital, a fire department, a modest fusion reactor, water and plumbing, all of the things you would expect for a small but self-contained town. Besides the monorail, there weren't many sky cars. Most people, Matt noticed, could probably get where they needed to go just by walking. Maybe there were a few dozen at the entire colony, and half of those were colony operated. He'd seen a few large transport vehicles, and guessed that they were either moving cargo from the space port into town, or they were moving minerals from the mine off-planet.

Still, not all of the colony served the company, and a few local stores and bars had sprung up. Matt and Jordan checked out a local this-and-that supply store, after being told that it sold small goods and had started making a killing with decorations for miners' living quarters. The store's owners said that their best competition was the black market, and that a pirate calling himself "Captain Hook" or "Captain America" had a way of slipping contraband onto the unmanned autonomous supply shuttles that periodically visited the colony. Matt had looked at Jordan and saw her trying to suppress a grin. Apparently Jordan's brother Jake had found creative ways to smuggle things.

The colony had five bars, and apparently business was always booming. No surprise there. Matt found the place that sold the pizza. In fact, he wanted to go there first. Its unassuming name was simply Pat's – and they found that its owner was a friendly olive-skinned woman with long dark curly hair named Patrizia Fanelli. She hadn't named the bar after herself. Rather, she named it after her grandfather Patrizio who owned a bar and pizza restaurant back on Earth. Her grandfather had passed his favorite recipes for pizza to his son, who had passed them on to his little daughter Patti. She said that some of her fondest early memories included her dad letting her sit on the kitchen counter while she watched him turning all sorts of funny-looking ingredients into delicious dinners, sliding them into an oven with bright orange or blue flames inside, and then seeing the dinner emerge minutes later. Not only did they offer the usual thin crust pizza, but also a deep dish pizza, and even a "duo pizza" that was basically two layers of pizza dough with sauce, cheese and some toppings in between.

"My pizza prevents a lot of hangovers and it'll cure the rest of them. I help get a lot of the miners back on their feet after a night at the Starboard," she had said, beaming with pride.

The Starboard, it turned out, was a bar located right alongside Pat's. Pat told them that a lot of miners who had finished a night of drunken carousing would stagger their way into Pat's and buy a pizza as a first step on the road to recovery.

"You've got the perfect location," Matt had said.

"It's no accident," Pat had replied. "You'll like the Starboard. Especially Nira. She's the bar's owner."

After they left Pat's, Jordan had told Matt that she wanted to go to her living quarters and relax, so he agreed to meet up with her later. He spent the better part of the afternoon looking at his map of the colony and wandering around, trying to get familiar with the place. It wasn't easy. The Rokas company had made the colony for efficiency and easy maintenance. For the most part, they all looked the same. A couple of grass fields crisscrossed by paved paths lay in the middle of the colony. He saw a few lawns, and other than that he saw all paved ground with buildings and some streets. New Ericson had few decorations, except for one statue of the Rokas company's founder – well, didn't that just figure, even here in the middle of nowhere – and no gardens to speak of. The grass was still a welcome sight compared to spaceships and space stations, though. It looked like a medium sized college campus, except for the fact that the bland buildings had no real character. Matt wandered through every floor of the colony's three main apartment buildings – really, the living spaces looked like multi-story hotels or college dorms, unless you were one of the few miners who'd brought a family. Or, in upper management. Matt figured that that admin Eve Chang and her turian deputy - Tasso something - probably didn't live in a 500 square foot efficieny apartment.

Matt passed by a salarian in an apartment building hallway and gave it a wide berth. He was still getting used to the idea of living around a lot of non-humans. He noticed some graffiti being removed by a turian and a human using laser scrubbers. They wore dark green clothes with patches that read Rokas Maintenance. The graffiti looked sloppy even by graffiti standards, as though the vandal had been attacked by a swarm of gnats while drawing. Still, he could read the words Humanity First, along with a crude drawing that might have been the Cerberus logo. The turian turned and looked at him as he walked by. He felt strange when he noticed the slogan. It felt welcome and familiar, and then it made his stomach turn. A part of him still wanted to believe that the Illusive Man hadn't put implants into his own troops to control them – especially not Jordan, not his teammates and certainly not him – but his near death on Ares Station kept hitting him in the face. Either the Illusive Man knew, or the Director at Ares had embarked on a little bit of empire building and done it all on his own. Terrorists had gone their own way and formed splinter factions before. But no. Wouldn't the Illusive Man have some of his own people spying on the Director to keep that from happening? That was the thing about leaders. Sometimes, their ambition took over from devotion to the cause. Matt shook his head. He could drive himself crazy thinking about these things. He reached the end of a corridor and expected to find a stairwell down to the next floor. Nope. Where was he again? He pressed his omni tool and started to bring up a map of his building.

"You look lost, human." The unmistakable flanging sound of a turian voice startled him from behind.

Matt turned to see a turian only a couple of feet behind him. He stood taller than Matt and straightened his bearing. His mandibles flared slightly in a dominant posture. Matt began to speak when a door slid open to his right. Another turian stood in the doorway. This one stepped out and angled his head down toward Matt.

The first one spoke again. "Nothing to say? Can't you talk, human?" He spoke slowly in a measured tone. "I asked you a question."

Matt could feel his muscles tense. From their tone and posture, these turians were trying to intimidate him. Well if they wanted a fight, it would be a short one. The turians had their size and raptor claws, but Matt had Cerberus special ops martial arts training. He could floor them both without breaking a sweat. Still, he didn't want to shed any blood on his first day.

"You're right, turian," said Matt. "I'm lost. I'm new here."

The second turian spoke. "I think he's lying, Prolus. I think he's here to admire his artwork. Or he knows who did. Do you know who drew that graffiti, human? Tell your friends that Bart Breen and his whelps don't frighten us. Anybody who draws a Cerberus logo in Palaven Minor will end up in the hospital."

Matt's face began to flush with annoyance. He didn't know who the hell Bart Breen was, didn't know what Palaven Minor meant, and really didn't care either way. The turian named Prolus raised a hand to the other one. "I think you can give it a rest. This human doesn't look stupid. Not that stupid, anyway. There are smarter ways for a human to find trouble."

"Hey look," said Matt, trying to hide his irritation. _Not that stupid? You don't exactly look like the sharpest tool in the shed either._ "I just got here, and that's the truth. I don't know any Bart Breen or who drew that. I'm just getting the lay of the land and walking through the place. This building gets like a maze." Two other doors slid open in the hallway. Two more turians stepped out. _What the hell? Is everyone in this hallway a freaking turian?_

Prolus laughed. "You wandered your way into Palaven Minor, human. You're not the first human to find his way into a hallway where he doesn't belong." He pointed in the opposite direction. "Straight back the way you came. Go to the lounge with the billiards table. Turn right. Past the alcove with the vending machines you'll find the elevator. Try not to get lost."

Matt nodded and said, "Thanks, turian" as he walked past. He felt their eyes on his back as he walked. He tensed, half expecting one of them to trip him, toss something at him or at least an insult, but none came. _Palaven Minor? What the hell's that?_ He remembered that some miners could request a specific set of living quarters to be close to their friends, and wondered if some races had decided that they'd rather spend most of their time living with their own species, instead of mixing like most of the miners seemed to be doing. He wondered if other hallways unofficially allowed only one species. Only asari, salarian, krogan, drell…or human?

He kicked himself for letting the first turian walk up behind him. He was a trained soldier. How had he let that happen? It was one thing for Evan to get behind him in the Ares Station cargo bay. Evan wore a tactical cloak and gunfire sounds filled that place. Things happened in the fog of war. But this? No excuse. He wouldn't let that happen again.

He glanced at his reflection in a window as he walked out of the building. Was that the face of a terrorist? He became lost in thought as he walked across a grass field. A human female and an asari threw a ball back and forth not far from him. He felt that Cerberus had left a charcoal stain on his soul that he might never remove. Or worse, that Cerberus had given him the charcoal and he'd gladly drawn the stain himself. He'd even enjoyed it, but didn't realize what he was doing until it was too late. The devil liked the work that way. He cursed the day that he met the strong, ready, smiling Cerberus recruiter. "What do you want?" he asked them. Then the bastard always found a way to steer their hopes for a better future toward Cerberus. Matt left his family to join Cerberus, and in the months leading up to that fateful day he'd said a bunch of things that he wished he could take back. Some families had doctors, lawyers, and scientists. Others had laborers, mechanics, plumbers, and other blue collar jobs. Or miners, like here on New Ericson. Respectable people living their lives and raising their families. What did his family say about him? My son…the terrorist. My brother…terrorist. Did they anybody admire him or think he was heroic, willing to take part in a cause, like he'd told himself when Cerberus recruited him? He was sure that they didn't. They probably thought he'd only walked out to avoid growing the hell up and having a man's responsibilities. Or that he'd been brainwashed. Well, heck, they didn't miss the mark too far on that one, did they? Did anyone even remember him anymore? Did anyone miss him?

Hell with it. He decided that he'd done enough exploring for one day. He looked up the directions to his quarters. The building stood across the courtyard.

Matt found his quarters, dropped his gear and sized up the place. He hung up a small poster that he'd bought earlier. His first decoration in his new living quarters as a free man. It didn't matter that he had a fake background. He'd take it. The picture showed a beach with large boulders in the surf, with a rain forest jungle surrounding the shore line. He wondered if the place was Costa Rica. He'd heard the place was really beautiful, but he'd only been to Earth once, and his parents had told him that they didn't go there. He looked around the room. His efficiency room was cramped by some miner's standards, but not Matt's. After spending his Cerberus time living in a barracks with no privacy, he liked having his own bed again. He looked at his omni tool and remembered the code that he and Jordan could use to summon their infiltrator shuttle if they needed to run from the colony in a hurry. The shuttle had landed under cloak by auto pilot about two thousand miles East of the New Ericson settlement. He thought of their weapons packs, infiltrator battle suits and electronic warfare packs sitting in the shuttle, quietly waiting for someone to stumble across them. Of course, no one would – the shuttle's hull could draw on solar power, and it was more than enough to keep its stealth mode running indefinitely. Finding a single cloaked shuttle in the middle of thousands of square miles of unsettled wilderness would be like walking into one's backyard and then accidentally getting struck by a meteor. Now granted, it could happen, and it really had happened to a handful of insanely unlucky people in real life – or so Matt had heard – but it didn't worry him. He'd make sure to check for meteors as he left the building.

He could almost hear his bed calling him. He checked the lock on the door to his room three times, just like any self-respecting fugitive defector should. He changed into some lighter clothes and climbed into bed. Before fading off to sleep, he sent Jordan a text message: "I'm in room 422 of the North tower. Taking power nap. Meet at 6 for dinner?"

Jordan responded with her own text a moment later. "Sounds good."

Matt glanced at the door and the window one more time. The soft mattress felt strange to him. He was so used to the barracks mattresses from his soldier days and space transports, he was tempted to climb down and sleep on the floor. He thought he'd be more comfortable. No. No, he owed himself at least one night in a real bed. If anyone tried to break into the room, he was sure that his trained soldier ears would wake him up. He'd be ready.

 _Rest easy, soldier. Get some sleep already. You and Jordan owe yourselves some shots tonight._ He was asleep in under a minute.


	6. Pranked, then Meeting the Team

Matt had a dream that night. It was a memory from more than a dozen summers ago.

Little Matty Gerrard, five years old, shivered with excitement. He also shivered because he stood in a line to use the diving board at a local swimming pool. A slight breeze drifted around him. All of the colonists were allowed to use the pool, but today his parents finally allowed him to use one of the pool's diving boards. Today was the greatest thing ever. Greatest. Thing. Ever.

He beamed when it was his turn to go next. Was his Dad watching him? He'd make sure. "Daddy, Daddy, watch me! Watch me watch me watch me!"

His dad laughed as he lay in a lounge chair not far from the pool. "Go, kid, go!" His mother looked up from a book and smiled. Matty had his father's dark hair and his mother's blue eyes.

Matty let out a whoop as he sprinted forward, leaped into the air, waved his arms and legs and yelled as he plummeted toward the water and landed with a tremendous splash. He could hear his parents and siblings cheering as he broke the surface.

"I'm gonna do it again! I'm gonna do it again!"

His dad smiled and raised a fist and his mother whistled in approval. This was the best. The best!

…

A couple of hours later, dawn approached at New Ericson colony. Matt's dream faded into the gray fog where everyone's dreams went. He blinked as the morning light in his room signaled a new morning, and tried to remember what he'd seen and heard in his dream. It was summertime and he was with his family. He was little. And happy. Yes, he had been happy. He remembered that much. Well, he was naïve then, too. He wasn't anywhere near close to understanding the way the world worked. He hadn't seen – hadn't really seen – how cruel the galaxy could be. Now that he was grown up, he'd decided that everyone in the galaxy was either "as crazy as" or "crazier than." Nobody in the galaxy was sane anymore.

He felt the sandpaper day old scruff on his face. He might as well shave. He was going to get dirty in the mine, for sure. But it was his first day at something resembling a job since he'd defected from Cerberus. Might as well look presentable just on principle.

Matt looked out the window and saw that rays of bright sun lit up New Ericson to start a new day. Vast puffy clouds dotted the brilliant blue sky from horizon to horizon, but didn't appear to threaten a storm. It wasn't supposed to rain that day, anyway. In the distance, he could see a couple of early risers jogging in from forest trail paths not far away. He should check out the hiking trails, or maybe do some jogging himself. The rec center said something about kayaks available for rent, too.

Matt hadn't bothered to watch the news that morning. All that the news channels talked about was the Reaper War, and after a short time it sounded like the same things being said over and over again. Cities were getting reduced to rubble. Soldiers were fighting. Refugees were fleeing. People were dying. Hell, were they using the same war footage again and again? Maybe they only changed the caption. He saw an advertisement for a comedy movie that was going to air that night. Supposedly it was a remake of a famous classic, something about a few hung over guys who misplaced their friend after a crazed bachelor party from the night before. The krogan who played a hapless character named Alan looked hilarious. Was a hapless krogan actually possible? He didn't think so.

He'd received a message from his new team leader the previous night. Apparently his supervisor was an asari named Seelid Matari. Her text message welcomed him to New Ericson, told him to get a good night's sleep, eat a hearty breakfast, take the monorail to mine site, get dressed into gear, and assemble near the entrance to the mine. He was going to be a member of Blue Team, whatever that meant. The asari added that he should get downstairs in a hurry while the food was still hot.

So he'd be taking orders from an asari. Well, whatever. If he had to spend the next couple of years churning up rocks under the ground, he would've liked it more if he could've been taking his orders from a human. Oh well. You couldn't have everything.

The cold water in the shower shook him for a few seconds until giving way to heat. He wondered if he should even bother cleaning himself before a day of churning up dirt and rocks in a mine, but he figured it was better that he did. It was bad enough that he'd be getting dirty under the ground, but he didn't need to add his own stench on top of it. His mind began to clear and sharpen as he brushed his teeth, shaved, and combed his hair. He was Matt Gerrard, a former badass soldier who'd escaped from Cerberus. Compared to his recent past, his new life as a miner would be a piece of cake. He picked up a duffel bag with a change of clothes and sent a message to Jordan. He'd meet her at the entrance to the downstairs cafeteria for breakfast. He slid open the door to his apartment and walked through the door with purpose in his stride.

That worked right up until Matt walked straight through the doorway and into an invisible barrier. Matt's eyes widened in shock as a transparent industrial-strength sheet of plastic wrap strained hard against his weight and threw him like a rag doll backward into his apartment. Through the sheet Matt had an instant of time to see a human male, a salarian, and a krogan all burst out roaring with laughter as they saw him hurtle through the air.

The world spun around Matt as he tumbled backward and landed in a sprawl in the middle of his room. The miners outside were laughing as hard as ever after he landed. He heard more laughing and applause.

"Great job, human!" It was the krogan. "I really thought you were going to break through."

"Hey, noob, are you all right? Are you okay? Sorry about that." It was the human. As Matt staggered to his feet, he saw that the man had a heavy build, olive skin and dark hair, and was starting to pull down the plastic wrap sheet. "Oh my God. I can't breathe. The look on your face, dude."

"Works every time – I told you it works every time!" The salarian's rapid laughter and speech sounded like the amphibian was on laughing gas or something. It clumsily pulled the other side of the plastic wrap off the door frame.

"Nice job," grumbled Matt. "Nice. Do you guys pull pranks on all the new miners?"

The krogan extended a clawed hand about twice the size of his own and patted him on the shoulder with the other one. "Yes. We do. Especially for the new members of Blue Team. Seelid gave us your name and told us to meet with you. She doesn't mind if we do pranks, as long as we don't hurt anybody. We found out where you lived and it was easy from there. I'm Makson Strig. You're, uh, Matt Gerrard, aren't you?"

The human chuckled as he pulled off the last of the plastic wrap. "Makson's always worried that we punked the wrong guy. That hasn't happened yet." He extended his hand to Matt and they shook. "Vince Pastan, good to meet you. Our intel expert on pranks is Ezoni."

The salarian nodded. "Ezoni Fopik. I help Makson and Vincent with pranks. I'm good at finding out things." It spoke so quickly Matt wondered if he was tripping on LSD or cocaine.

Vince helped Matt to his feet. "Hope you didn't mind the prank. We always do them to welcome the new guys. Seelid and the rest of team leads are already at the mine. She looks forward to meeting you."

"No problem. Good to meet you guys."

The group walked with Matt toward an elevator. "Makson, you might need to wait while we go downstairs," said Ezoni. "These elevators aren't big enough for you."

The krogan waved a clawed hand at the salarian as the elevator door opened. "I think they made these elevators with you little guys in mind." It was big enough to hold them all, though Makson did dominate the space. "So Matt, have you been to the Pat's yet?"

"My friend Jordan and I went last night. Fun place. I really liked the pizza. I'm meeting Jordan for breakfast."

Vince stood with arms folded and grinned over his shoulder. "You're both welcome to join us. We don't pull any pranks when we're eating. Pat's is a great place. Try the cheesesteaks. They've got a cook from Philadelphia."

Ezoni glanced toward Vince. It spoke tersely and snapped, "Cheesesteaks clog arteries worse than any food in existence. Are you trying to die, Vincent?"

"Whatever, Ezoni." He glanced toward Matt again. "Cheesesteaks. Get one."

A light breeze went over their faces as the elevator door slid open. A pair of turians and a group of three humans walked by toward a large entrance to the cafeteria on the lower level of the building. Matt saw Jordan standing with a group of three humans near the entrance. One of them seemed to be giving Jordan the "Okay" symbol. The man had short brown hair, a goatee, an average build, and a buzz cut. Jordan noticed Matt, and he saw her eyes seemed to look over his company – the krogan, the human, and the salarian. Her smile faded slightly.

"Hey, Jordan!" He nodded toward his own group. "I met these guys this morning. Apparently I'm on their team. They pulled a prank on me."

Buzz Cut Man grinned toward Matt and said, "Is that right? You let these guys get the drop on you?" He extended a hand slapped a hard handshake to Matt. Matt noticed that the guy seemed to be gripping his hand overly hard, and holding it longer than he needed to. "Bart Breen. Nice to meet you." He also noticed that Bart didn't seem to pay any attention to the other people that he was standing with.

 _Oh, jeez isn't that a funny coincidence? Just one day after I meet a grouchy turian who thinks I know a guy named Bart Breen, I end up meeting Bart Breen. Startling._ Matt smiled back and tried to let go of the handshake. "I'm going to need that hand back, Bart."

Makson chuckled. "Good one."

Bart let go of Matt's hand. Matt kept the tone light. "Yeah, I made a fool of myself all right. They pulled the old plastic wrap prank on my door."

One of Bart's friends gave what seemed to be a false smile and spoke next. He wore a black shirt with a red logo for the Calgary Flames. "Plastic wrap? Nice one, Vince. Ingenious. Did you think of that all by yourself, or did your buddy Godzilla help you out?"

Makson was completely unfazed. "I'm a big fan of Godzilla. But he's got better breath than you."

Jordan finally interrupted them all. "Who's hungry, guys?"

The rest of breakfast went uneventfully. A few monitors displayed public service type announcements about the colony interspersed with morning news. People near the monitors tended to look up when the war footage came on. For the most part, the news footage about the Reaper War looked much like Matt had already seen before. The news showed colorful galactic maps showing conflict areas. One map showed the whole galaxy, overlaid with the mass relay network like the arteries of a leaf. The Reapers, whatever they were, had already spread pretty far along the main arteries. The commentators spoke with important looking experts who probably said a lot of words without really saying anything at all, and they probably found new ways to say the same things over and over again without adding all that much information. The war footage had been cleared by Alliance censors.

A chill went through Matt as the Illusive Man appeared on a few monitors for a moment. The caption below him read, "ILLUSIVE MAN DENIES RUMORS." Gee, that was hard hitting journalism. What rumors? Well, that could be anything. He kept waiting to see footage of Alliance or Turian troops sifting through debris on Ares Station, but didn't see any.

At the table there was some good natured banter back and forth, although Matt wondered if some of Bart's sarcastic digs toward Makson, Vince and Ezoni had a harder edge than they needed. Especially the jokes toward the salarian Ezoni, who seemed to think the banter was beneath him. Jordan seemed comfortable with Bart and his friends. A couple of people walked by their table and said hello to Bart, who seemed to have a following among some of the miners. One of them gave the "okay" sign as they walked by. Was that a thing with the mining teams here?

Even though Bart didn't have an impressive presence, among his friends he was clearly the alpha. Bart's other two friends seemed follow his lead in the conversations, they laughed after Bart did, they added their own jokes and comments after Bart did, things like that. Matt wondered if they even realized they were doing it. Jordan didn't follow his lead, though. If Jordan saw Bart as an equal, then Matt thought that was to Bart's credit, not Jordan's. No one in Matt's group deferred to him either. Vince spent more time getting to know Matt. Ezoni always seemed to be looking up information on his omni tool, and Makson in particular seemed to regard Bart with the mild annoyance that one might give toward a grumpy relative.

While chewing on a piece of buttered toast, Matt noticed someone glance their way at a distance. Three turians were walking toward the cafeteria exit, and one of them was that turian named Prolus who had tried to intimidate Matt on the previous day. Matt recognized the other two turians from the hallway. Prolus' expression darkened for a moment, and his pace slowed, and then the group resumed walking out.

A mild tone sounded from the room's overhead speakers and most of the people in the cafeteria began to rise from their seats. Vince said, "That's our cue, Matt. The monorail heads for the mine in 30 minutes. Let's head over and we might get seats."

"Sounds good."

After a ten minute walk through a courtyard, past the rec center, and the town's fire department building, they reached the monorail train's boarding platform. A few hundred miners were already there, with more arriving. He thought he recognized a couple of refugees from their trip to New Ericson speaking with a couple of public works people. One of the Public Works people seemed to be telling a refugee how to use a piece of street cleaning equipment. He noticed a young boy watching the pair, and a flash of recognition entered Matt's eyes.

"Hey Tommy!"

The boy from the freighter glanced toward Matt's voice. "Hi Mister Matt!"

"Are they putting you to work?"

"No, just my dad!"

Tommy's father glanced toward Matt and gave him a smile and wave.

The monorail's boarding platform stood on a grassy hill in the middle of town. A few trees lined the entranceway, with others scattered on the hill. The monitors showed announcements involving the weather and train operation. An empty sky car with the word SECURITY was parked at the bottom of the hill. Matt didn't mind the walk, and it seemed that nothing around New Ericson was really all that far from anything else if you didn't mind the exercise. As they approached the platform, he saw a krogan and a red-haired human with a beard and stocky build wearing black police gear with the word SECURITY written on their backs. Their demeanor was attentive though casual. Clearly they didn't expect trouble this morning. Still, they carried the usual police gear: ballistic vests, plasma machine pistols, taser sticks, bindings, omni tools and com lines. The red-haired officer noticed their approach. Matt noticed the name ZIKOV on his jacket. The number of stripes on his sleeves suggested that he had higher rank than the krogan.

"Good morning, gentlemen. Stay safe today."

Matt was about to say good morning when Bart spoke up in a loud voice. He was smiling. "Do you miss me yet, Z?"

The krogan security officer snorted. Zikov smiled toward Bart and answered, "Bart, I see you often enough already. Behave yourself. Be good out there, guys. Stay safe."

Bart looked at Jordan with a grin. "Zikov knows me really well. I've gotten into trouble once or twice. But he's all right."

Vince tossed in, "Bart's not very bright. Most of us know how to have a good time without having Zikov and Nandok lock us up in an overnight holding cell."

Bart shot back, "You don't know how to have a really good time, Vince."

Matt made a mental note that he'd spend more time getting to know Vince, Makson and Ezoni, and less time with people like Bart.

…

The monorail train sped away from town at high speed for a thirty minute journey to the mine. Mass effect-driven technology provided a smooth quiet ride as the near forested valleys blurred past them. After about 10 minutes, the forests gave way to the rugged barren terrain of the mountain range. He'd been on plenty of monorail trains before. Most of them had a display that told the passenger where the next stops were coming up. This one showed a basic terrain map, and a simple line that snaked its way between the features of the mountain range. There were three dots on the line. One of them was New Ericson colony. The second dot was the train. And the third dot was the end of the line. It was the mine.

Matt could imagine the monorail's massive iron supports shaking as the train rumbled by. He wondered if there were any deer or wolves looking up toward the mechanical beast, or if they'd gotten used to the sight of the train by now. Heck, he wondered what forest animals lived on this planet.

"Are there any wolves here?"

Vince was standing closest to him. "Come again?"

"Wolves. Are there any wolves on this planet? Or deer. Or squirrels. I'm just wondering what kinds of animals live here."

"Yeah, there are some earth-like animals. Not exactly like the ones on Earth, but similar. There was some guy from a visiting science institute who gave a talk on how it'd take a perfect storm of events for the wildlife to evolve like Earth. I didn't understand half of it, but it was a pretty cool speech. He said that there used to be a lot of dire wolves here just a few thousand years ago."

"The colony admin paid to have somebody fly all the way out here to tell a bunch of dusty miners about wolves and squirrels?"

"I know, right? It sounds crazy, but somebody put in the idea, and Eve Chang listened. She cares about morale. Pretty cool that they were willing to do it."

"So, what's a dire wolf?"

"Think of the biggest wolf you've ever seen, and now imagine it taking growth hormones and anabolic steroids."

"Whoa."

"Yeah. Cool stuff. But anyway, there are some wolves here. And a lot of wildlife similar to what you'd see on places like Earth. But a lot of weird stuff too. The guy said that this planet has things that look like giraffes except that they have shorter necks. Dwarf bears. Things that look like turtles except that they have sprinter speed. Furry rhinos with blue fur."

"Weird stuff. Any platypuses?"

"Who knows. I don't think they're explored much of the planet with any boots on the ground besides this area."

"I'm surprised nobody's opened an eco-tourism company here."

"If this planet wasn't so far off the mass relay network, somebody might have. Give them time."

He glanced toward Jordan, who still seemed to be hitting it off well with Bart Breen. He felt a moment of jealousy flare up toward the man who was talking to his sergeant. Which was strange, because he'd never felt jealous about anybody talking to Jordan. Then he noticed something strange.

Matt nodded in Bart's general direction. "What's with the 'okay' sign? I saw a few guys flash him that sign."

Vince glanced over his shoulder as Makson turned toward them. "Oh, you noticed the secret handshake, did you?"

"Secret handshake?"

Makson lowered his head as though telling a secret. "They're fans of Cerberus."

Matt's stomach dropped. "Cerberus? Here?"

Vincent said, "No, Cerberus isn't here. I don't think they're this far out in the sticks. But Bart Breen and his buddies are big fans. The three fingers in the 'okay' sign were Bart's idea. The three fingers represent the three heads on the Cerberus dog that guards the gate of hell."

"You're kidding," said Matt, frowning.

"It's true. I got to know Bart when I first arrived here, then I got tired of his act. There's more. You see the guy standing by the window, wearing the Calgary Flames shirt?"

Matt looked. "That's the guy who called Makson 'Godzilla.' "

"Yep," said Makson. "The letter C in the Calgary Flames logo is a homage to the flipped vertical C that Cerberus uses in their logo."

"Oh, come on," Matt shook his head. "He must be a hockey fan."

Ezoni chimed in. "Do you see that other one, talking to Bart?" There was a person from Breen's group who wore a Baltimore Orioles jersey with the number 8.

Matt gave them a cross look. "So he's a fan of the Orioles. Good heavens, no, not that."

Ezoni countered, "There are 8 letters in the word 'Cerberus'. That's what the number 8 stands for."

Matt frowned and shook his head. "Oh for pete's sake. Come on. You guys spend too much time online. Or, you guys have read the Da Vinci Code too many times."

"One time is happenstance," said Ezoni. "Two times is coincidence. Three times is enemy action. Too many coincidences, Matt."

"That's schoolyard b.s. Those guys act like Cerberus is a sports team. They're terrorists." The last two words burned in Matt's stomach.

"You don't need to convince us," said Vince. "One of these days Bart might get somebody hurt. I heard he made one of the new miners scrawl some lame graffiti in a turian hallway as an initiation rite."

"I saw it. I got lost and walked right past it. That was dumb. That was a good way to get that new miner beaten up. I met a turian named Prolus who blamed Bart."

"Bart could use a good ass-kicking, but Prolus and Bart are opposite sides of the same coin. Bart's a bigger jerk, though."

"So what's up with Bart's crowd? Are they like a gang or a would-be frat?"

"They're jerks," said Vince. "And Bart is the center of their orbit. Bart's a decent miner, he's got some natural leadership and he likes to speak his mind, but he wastes it with his dumb attitudes about non-humans. He finds ways to get booze and then he holds drinking parties in the woods outside colony limits. That's where I got to talk to him. There he can surround himself with his buddies who share his attitude and he doesn't need to worry about Zikov or Nandok hauling him off to the drunk tank. He says they're just having harmless fun, but he needs to know when to quit."

Matt heard Jordan laugh. He didn't look in her direction. "It's too bad Jordan seems to like them. Maybe she'll change her mind." He leaned forward as a couple of miners moved around him on the train. He noticed that they were five minutes from away the mine. "When do we see the mine?"

Makson gestured toward a window to Matt's left. "You'll see it through that window. It's just beyond this next pass."

Matt felt the train angling downward and looked through the window. He saw a series of buildings, fire stacks, conveyors, shipping cars, and hundreds of people in an area nestled at the bottom of a group of mountains. There were multiple pathways leading into tunnels that must have been fifty feet high.

"So that's the mine."


End file.
